Bec Striffler is an ASU Cronkite School of Journalism student assigned to cover Westview High School for AZPreps365.com.

After two weeks off for COVID-19 precautions, the Westview High School Lady Knights volleyball team fell to the Sunnyslope High School Lady Vikings in a 6A Southwest region match Thursday night, 25-15, 25-14, 25-9.

Westview (8-8, 1-1) struggled to keep up with consistent kills from Sunnyslope (20-11, 3-1) throughout all three sets, resulting in the first loss for the Lady Knights outside of tournament play — perhaps due to a two-week pause from practice and competition. 

“The quarantine and being gone slows down their bodies,” said Westview assistant coach Chyna Carter. “It slows down their playing time. Their bodies start to get tired from being gone for a while.”

The Lady Knights resumed practice on Monday, missing their head coach Alex Bybee this week. Coach Carter stepped up in her absence.

Bybee, who watched the livestreamed game, said over the phone, “I told the girls after the game that was proud of them for persevering through the last couple of weeks with patience and grace, and not to hang their heads. Hopefully, this woke them up and gets them hungry to get going again.”

On the heels of a 3-0 loss to Xavier Prep Wednesday night, Sunnyslope brought incredible offense to the match, with freshman outside hitter Georgi Stein leading in kills for the night. 

The Lady Knights struggled defensively with many communication errors at the net, but they also did not take many chances offensively and struggled with consistent serving. Senior outside hitter Emysiah Matthews led the Lady Knights with five kills in the match, struggling to break the strong blocks from Sunnyslope.

“We need to focus on plays more and running them,” Westview junior setter Maddy Yates said, noting that the team needed to focus more on consistent serving. “I just need to work on my setting, because I’m still new to setting.”

The Lady Knights were more than excited to have their junior setter Dylan Cain back on the court after a month off with an ankle injury. Cain played all around, with some success hitting from the right side, aided by Yates and sophomore Amirrah Hicks setting throughout the match.

Bybee said of Dylan, “I was very impressed with Dylan’s return to the game coming off of that injury. It’s a lot more than being pain-free. She stepped back into her role on the court very well, so I’m proud of her for doing that and waiting to be healed before coming back.”

Cain noted of her team’s performance, “I think we need to work more on our covering. I think our defense was starting to get there towards the end. It took us a second to warm up.”

The first set saw no more than a six-point scoring run from Sunnyslope, with lots of free ball plays from the Lady Knights and communication errors, particularly at the net. Consistent kills close to the line solidified the Lady Vikings offense, startling the Lady Knights.

In the second set, the Lady Knights saw more kills and offensive risks with two kills from Matthews. However, even with some serving errors on Sunnyslope’s side of the court, the Lady Vikings still took the set with their impressive offense.

In the final set, the Lady Vikings had an eight-point run containing five kills and two aces, giving them the lead 19-8. The Lady Knights struggled to recover with an error at the net finishing the set.

Carter said, “I knew that our defense was going to be a struggle, so going forward, from here on out, we’ve got to work on our front row defense, because there were times where we had no middle going up, and we left front row wide open. Facing Valley Vista and Shadow Ridge, front row defense has to be solid.”

Westview will play its next region match at Shadow Ridge on Wednesday night at 6 p.m. Sunnyslope will play Sandra Day O’Connor at home on Oct. 18 at 6 p.m. after a bye week.