June 2, 2010
St. Peter's Prep reaches final
Senior Kenny Walter had 10 kills and nine digs for St. Peter's Prep yesterday.
By Jason Bernstein
Editorial Director
HILLSBOROUGH – Faced against a resilient Fair Lawn defense, the game plan for St. Peter’s Prep outside hitters Parker Kolodka and Kenny Walter was simple – keep attacking.
The Marauders’ dynamic outside duo did just that, combining for 25 kills as St. Peter’s Prep prevailed 25-22, 25-20 in the NJSIAA Semifinals yesterday at Hillsborough High School.
“(In the second game) I think our offense really just overpowered them,” Kolodka said. “They played great defense, but we were just putting everything down. We didn’t let their digs get in our heads we just kept swinging and we prevailed.”
“That’s our game plan,” said Prep coach Don Guide about the aggressiveness on offense. “We don’t want to ease off, we want to go for it.”
The two seniors took over in the second game, as they played a hand in nine of the final 13 points scored by the top-ranked Marauders (29-2) in the match.
The Cutters (32-5) cut the deficit to within one point on five separate occasions, the fifth to make it 18-17 in favor of Prep. Kolodka and the Marauders responded with back-to-back kills to jump-start a 7-3 run to end the match.
“I just wanted to win,” Kolodka said. “I’m so tired of when we’re playing good teams, we play so well and then it’s one or two little mistakes (which cost us). Me and Kenny just did whatever we had to do to win that game. We were not going to let that one slip away.”
“Parker’s on and I was on today,” Walter said. “Whenever the ball was hit today there was just no stopping it.”
Walter would cap off the run with kills on two of the final three plays and send the Marauders to the state final for the fourth consecutive year.
Kolodka also had an emphatic kill as St. Peter’s Prep overcame a 10-3 Fair Lawn run to make it 24-21 in the opening game.
Kolodka led all players with 15 kills. Walter added 10 kills and nine digs in the victory. Senior middle hitter John Armstrong added six kills, including the winning point of the first game.
Mike Blicharz had 26 assists to set up the Marauder hitters to go with seven digs. Alex Cogott and Alex Perez added 11 and eight digs respectively.
Dan Nugent led Fair Lawn with 10 kills. Dan Auld added eight kills and six digs, while Chris Nugent had nine digs. Matt Sarna chipped in with 23 assists.
With the victory, St. Peter’s Prep will face Southern on Thursday at 7 p.m. in a rematch of last year’s title game, won by Southern. After falling short in the final three years in a row, the Marauders believe that history will not repeat itself when they square off again.
“In the previous games of the state tournament we’ve been building (our game) up,” Walter said. “We’ve been working hard in practice, getting to where we need to be and we’re finally there. This is our year. This is our time”
Senior Parker Kolodka had a match-high 15 kills for St. Peter's Prep.
1st |
2nd |
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| Fair Lawn Cutters (32-5) | 22 |
20 |
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| St. Peter's Prep Marauders (29-2) | 25 |
25 |
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