Lincoln outlasts Toll Gate in five sets

By Ryan D. Murray
Posted 4/25/17

The Toll Gate Titans fell to the Lincoln Lions, 3-2, in a back-and-forth battle at Lincoln High School on Friday evening. Lincoln senior Aiden Enright had 21 kills and three aces, and fellow senior Zack Carvalho chipped

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Lincoln outlasts Toll Gate in five sets

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The Toll Gate Titans fell to the Lincoln Lions, 3-2, in a back-and-forth battle at Lincoln High School on Friday evening. Lincoln senior Aiden Enright had 21 kills and three aces, and fellow senior Zack Carvalho chipped in 12 kills and three aces.

With the loss, Toll Gate falls to 3-3 and Lincoln improves to 4-1.

The Titans dug themselves a 9-2 hole early in the first set. Toll Gate junior Eric Ruiz stopped the bleeding when he hit a blast past Carvalho to make it 9-3. Next, senior Rory Dobbins dropped a point down in front to pull the Titans within 9-4.

However, Lincoln would score four straight points, starting with Dan Hasegawa and ending with an ace from Charles Fish to increase the Lincoln lead to 13-4. Lincoln went up by as much as 17-5 before Dobbins, Estrella and Walsh scored three straight for the Titans to get it to 17-8.

A little later in the set, a spike by Toll Gate junior Max Laiter drew the Titans within 18-13. However, Toll Gate gave up two points after Dobbins’ serve was returned and it was penalized on the next play. Toll Gate would get as close as 23-19, but a return error on the Titans and an ace from Fish gave Lincoln a 25-19 victory in the first set. 

Toll Gate led 7-5 in the second set after Laiter and Tristan Wyns combined for a double block. Later, Dobbins scored with a spike and an ace to give Toll Gate a 12-10 edge.

Lincoln would eventually tie the set at 15, but Walsh responded with a return in front for Toll Gate to go up 16-15. A point from Ruiz on serve put the Titans up 18-16. But, Lincoln would get even again when Hasegawa scored to tie the match at 21. Walsh set up Laiter for the kill next, putting Toll Gate up one. The teams battled back and forth and were knotted at 25. In the end, Dobbins and Wyns scored to give Toll Gate a 29-27 win of set two, while tying the match at 1.

Hasegawa assisted to Enright early in the third set to give Lincoln a 6-3 lead. Dobbins swatted an ace to pull Toll Gate within 9-7. A little later, Laiter put one past Hasegawa and Tougas. Then, Estrella followed it with a kill to tie the game at 11. Lincoln’s Jared Yankee earned a big block against Estrella to give Lincoln some separation at 15-12. Moments later, Dobbins hit a monster spike to pull the Titans within 16-14.

Nonetheless, back-to-back points from Enright gave Lincoln an 18-15 edge. Lincoln won the third set, 25-22, after Fish set up Enright for the kill and Lincoln took a 2-1 lead in the match.

In the fourth set, the Titans went up, 1-0, when Walsh dished to Estrella for a point. Moments later, Walsh, Ruiz and Laiter all scored to give the Titans a 5-2 edge. Toll Gate stayed aggressive and jumped out to a 10-5 advantage.  

Later in the set, Laiter blocked Carvalho and Walsh scored an ace to help the Titans to a 20-10 cushion. However, Lincoln would score six straight times to cut it to four. Ruiz stepped up for Toll Gate though, and scored with a big spike to end the spurt, while putting Toll Gate up 22-17. The Titans would go on to win the fourth set, 25-18, while tying the match at 2.

Toll Gate went down early in the fifth and final set after Dobbins’ opening return went out of bounds. Enright put Lincoln up 2-0. The Titans got the deficit in half when Ruiz returned a serve by Lincoln’s Hasegawa. Toll Gate went up 4-3 after Laiter and Walsh combined for a double block on Enright. However, Enright got even with a return on the next play to tie the set at 4. Lincoln then built a 10-5 lead after kills from Enright and Yankee plus an ace from Fish.

Walsh set up Dobbins for a kill to pull the Titans within 11-7. But, Toll Gate wouldn’t score the rest of the way. Lincoln closed out the contest with four straight points coming from Enright, Hasegawa and finished with a double block from Carvalho and Yankee to seal it at 15-7.

“In set one, we got down too far,” Toll Gate head coach Ryan Garno said. “...When I burnt my second timeout, we played better after that. When you spot 12 points, it’s tough to come back...Set two, we played a little bit better, a little bit more controlled, still not piecing a nice string of runs together...Set three, looked like we went back to the same set one. Set four, we limited our errors a lot. Set five, a lot of errors. We had the ball at the net with big hitters going up and just not putting it away. So, it comes down to errors. If you’re able to force more errors than the other team, you usually come out on top. They force more errors on you, and usually they come out on top.”

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