Sandite Volleyball Falls 3-0 to Bishop Kelley, Ends Season at Regionals

The Charles Page High School volleyball team wrapped up a 14-17 season Tuesday evening with a 3-0 loss to No. 6 Bishop Kelley (21-12).

“We prepared much better than we played,” said head coach Skylar Jackson. “We know they run two different defenses…we worked on blocking well, we worked on attacking both defenses. We looked really sharp yesterday and we just didn’t play our best tonight.”

Sand Springs fell 25-13, 25-15, and 25-13 to the Comets, who went on to win a 3-0 sweep of No. 11 Mustang (22-8) for their 38th consecutive Regional Championship. The Sandites, meanwhile, have never won a Regional title, and haven’t survived the first round since 2017.

“We’re taking the right steps,” said Jackson. “We’ve just got to figure out our identity as Sand Springs Volleyball.”

The first game against the Comets was only as close as 7-6 before the home team went on an 8-1 run to put establish the tone of the sweep to come.

Sand Springs struggled to adjust to Kate Schneeberg, who doubled as middle blocker and setter, recording four blocks, 31 assists, and six kills, including tips and attacks.

Also posing a challenge was Indiana State-commit Curry Kendall, who amassed a game-high 17 kills as the most powerfully accurate hitter the Sandites have faced this season.

In game two the Sandites actually jumped out to an 8-4 lead with a seven-point run early in the game. Adelynn Ray scored three kills, Jayden Smith and Averi Tippit combined on a block, and Hannah McKelvey scored with a tipped ball during the exciting streak.

The Comets came surging back, however, with an 8-1 run, tying it up on an ace from Kate Strandmark before taking the lead on a pair of errors.

Sand Springs never led again, only getting as close as 13-12 before Schneeberg used a tipped ball to kick off a six point run. The Comets ended game two on a five point run to keep the momentum into set three.

The visitors got as close as 7-6 on a kill from Ray before a service error sparked a nine-point streak that put the game firmly in the Comets’ arena.

Alia DeBerry and Brooklyn Shope scored two kills apiece to make it 18-11 but it was too much of a deficit to overcome and Elle Miller put an end to the Sandites’ season.

Ray led the Sandites’ offense with 9 kills while Evyn Morrow led the defense with 13 digs. Hannah McKelvey had a team-high 10 assists.

The Sandites will be losing seven seniors next year, including four who saw significant playing time. Hannah and Faith McKelvey, Tippit, Morrow, Mikayla Bradford, Natalie Szabo, and Patience Pearce will all graduate in the spring.

“They’re strong at their positions for sure,” said Jackson. “They’re some of our stat leaders. Evyn’s definitely one of our energy leaders on the court. They’re going to leave a big gap next year for sure and our underclassmen are going to have to learn how to fill their shoes just like our current senior class did this year.”

BK 3 CPHS 0 (25-13, 25-15, 25-13)
Kills: BK 42, CPHS 21.
Blocks: BK 4, CPHS 2.
Aces: BK 7, CPHS 1.
Service Errors: BK 5, CPHS 5.
Total Errors: BK 17, CPHS 22.

(Sand Springs Stats)
Kills: Ray 9, Shope 4, DeBerry 3, Smith 3, Morrow 1, H. McKelvey 1.
Assists: H. McKelvey 10, Ray 7, Morrow 2, DeBerry 1, Shope 1.
Digs: Morrow 13, Shope 7, H. McKelvey 7, Ray 5, Smith 2, DeBerry 1, F. McKelvey 1.
Blocks: Tippit 1, DeBerry 0.5, Smith 0.5.
Aces: H. McKelvey 1.

(Bishop Kelley Stats)
Kills: Kendall 17, Gentry 6, Schneeberg 6, Laubach, 5, Williams 3, Liechtl 2, Toon 1, Jackson 1.
Assists: Schneeberg 31.
Blocks: Gentry 3, Schneeberg 2.5, Toon 0.5.
Aces: Williams 2, Strandmark 2, Jackson 2, Johnson 1.