For six matches, Sobrato found ways to win. Live Oak, meanwhile, found ways to keep going despite lack of numbers.
And true to form for a Live Oak-Sobrato rivalry game, the expectations went out the window.
The Acorns handed Sobrato its first Santa Teresa Division loss with a four-game win 25-20, 25-16, 15-25, 25-21.
Aubrey Harmel led the Acorns with eight kills with Lianne Rupp and Lindsay Baker adding six kills.
Harmel gave credit to the front row tandem of Rupp and Baker for taking away some of Sobrato’s attacks.
“Lianne has the hops and Lindsay has the height, so when they’re in the front row it’s just this giant wall,” Harmel said.”
She added that when it’s Baker and herself in the front row, they play off each other well and Baker helps her get in to a rhythm for her attacking.
Rupp and Harmel added four aces with Josilyn Layton contributing three aces and four kills.
For Sobrato, Siena Schilling had seven blocks to go with five kills.
Kacey Suess led the Bulldogs with seven kills with an additional five blocks.
Ellie Downing added six kills and three aces with Kelsey Gunsky recording six aces with three kills.
Live Oak entered the match with nothing to lose but as the first game got started, the Acorns figured out there was a chance.
“The girls play a lot on emotion, so if we get down, we don’t play ever well and we make a lot of unforced errors, like in the game that we lost,” said Live Oak coach Laura Coleman. “But when they get the momentum they get the confidence and they are like, hey you know, we can do this.”
Coleman said this match was as good as she seen her girls play.
Sobrato, meanwhile, was fighting a little of everything during the match. The Bulldogs fought to overcome early serve-receive mistakes, then some service mistakes, some unforced errors and finally close calls.
The Bulldogs several times found themselves on the sour end of close line calls and loudly pleaded with the officials for relief.
And for the Bulldogs, relief was hard to come by. Just one of those close calls were reversed in Sobrato’s favor.
But it wasn’t one thing that cost Sobrato and ultimately, the Acorns played well enough through the match to make everything add up.
Live Oak went up 6-1 quickly in the first game and eventually held a 13-6 lead before Sobrato found its footing.
The Bulldogs did make a run thanks to the serving of Kacey Suess, going on a 4-0 run to pull within three at 13-10.
But Live Oak continued to find a way to stay ahead.
“When we started to rack up points, that’s when our confidence really increased,” Harmel said. “That’s when we started to run our trick plays and started running our hits harder and faster.”
Baker had a block, Rupp and Zoie Brotherton had kills and Layton had an ace to put the Acorns up 19-11.
Again, Sobrato didn’t go down quietly.
The Bulldogs had two aces from Stephanie Claughesy as they went on a quick run to pull within 20-17.
From there, however, both teams traded points until Live Oak finally clinched Game 1 25-20.
Game 2 started better for Sobrato with Gunsky and Claughesy both serving aces to eventually put Sobrato up 7-5.
But Live Oak got back its rhythm led by an ace from Layton and a kill from Rupp to eventually go on an 11-2 scoring run.
Those, however, were the only two forced points for the Acorns in that stretch as the Bulldogs committed nine errors.
Sobrato broke the run with a kill from Gunsky and an ace from Downing, but ultimately couldn’t stem the tide.
Live Oak had kills from Rupp, Layton and Baker with an ace from Rupp along the way to eventually close out on an 8-5 run for a 2-0 lead.
With their backs against the wall, Sobrato staved off the upset for a set thanks to taking an early lead and never allowing Live Oak to go on top.
The Acorns did get to within one a couple of times, but each time, Sobrato went on a run to retake a comfortable margin.
With Live Oak pulling to within 6-5, Sobrato went on a 6-0 run led by the blocking of Suess, who had two in the stretch.
Live Oak did have a run midway through, pulling to within 14-13 thanks to a pair of aces from Sarah Carmichael.
But after getting within 15-14, Sobrato finally closed the door with the serving of Gunsky.
Live Oak committed several unforced errors which helped things along, but Gunsky very nearly served the final 10 points of the match, recording nine service points with three aces.
The Acorns briefly caught a break with an error to take back the serve, but Claughesy sent home a kill to end the set at 25-15.
The momentum briefly carried over to the fourth game as Sobrato went on a 5-0 run to kick things off that eventually grew to an 8-2 lead.
Live Oak clawed back slowly and eventually tied the game at 12-all thanks to a pair of aces from Harmel.
After trailing 12-8, Live Oak went on an 11-3 scoring run, taking the lead for good at 19-15 when Sobrato put an end to the stretch with kills from Schilling
and Downing.
And like in the first game, the two teams traded points with Live Oak holding on to a two-to-three-point margin throughout, eventually serving match point following a pair of
Rupp kills.
An error briefly kept Sobrato alive, but eventually a missed pass from Sobrato fell out of bounds and Live Oak celebrated on the court.
Sobrato now returns home to take on Prospect to close out the first half of league play. Live Oak, meanwhile, hits the road to take on Santa Teresa. Both game are slated fro 6 p.m.
Harmel said this will should do wonders for the team as it gets ready to start the second half of league play.
“I think we have a lot more confidence because they were undefeated and we were the first team to beat them,” Harmel said.
