The surprise wasn’t so much that the Oak Harbor High School volleyball team defeated first-place Shorewood on the Thunderbirds’ floor Wednesday, Oct. 29, but that the Wildcats did it with a 3-0 shutout.
The win in the regular season’s final game lifted Oak Harbor (9-3, 9-5) into a three-way tie for second place with Arlington (9-3, 10-4) and Edmonds-Woodway (9-3,10-4), one game back of Shorewood (10-2, 10-5).
The final standings in the highly competitive Wesco 3A Conference were cramped; the top six teams were within two games.
In a season when 3-2 scores were the norm across the conference, Shorewood was the one dominant team, winning five straight matches 3-0 before stumbling against the Wildcats.
Though Oak Harbor swept the Thunderbirds, the match was close: 26-24, 26-24, 25-19.
“We played great tonight,” coach Kerri Molitor said. “If we can stay consistent, we should see some great volleyball at districts.”
The top seven Wesco teams and Ferndale, the Northwest Conference’s lone 3A team, will begin the double-elimination district tournament Saturday, Nov. 1.
Oak Harbor will return to Shorewood to begin district, meeting Ferndale at 2 p.m. in a rematch of last year’s title match won by the Golden Eagles.
Ferndale (9-3, 11-3), which is ranked sixth in the state 3A poll, returns most of it championship squad from last year. Its only losses this season were to Sehome and Burlington-Edison, ranked third and fourth in the state 2A poll, and Lynden Christian, ranked second in the 1A poll.
The Golden Eagles also defeated Oak Harbor 3-1 in this year’s season opener Sept. 9.
The Oak Harbor-Ferndale winner will meet the winner between Shorewood and the tournament’s eighth seed (which will be determined by a match between Shorecrest and Marysville-Pilchuck Thursday night) in the second round at Shorewood at 7 p.m. Tuesday, Nov. 4. The losers meet before that contest at 5 p.m.
In Wednesday’s win over Shorewood, Oak Harbor’s Claire Anderson recorded 21 kills and 10 digs.
She was helped on offense by Amelia Berner’s seven kills and 24 assists from Hailey Beecher and 12 from Natalie McVey.
Priya Osborne paced the defense with 18 digs; AnnaBelle Whitefoot had 13.
