Ardrey Kell dominates East Meck, wins Southwestern 7A/8A volleyball championship
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Ardrey Kell won Southwestern 7A/8A title, completing a 10-0 regular season.
- Knights beat East Mecklenburg 3-1; Moorea Atkins had nine kills and key clinch.
- Season momentum marked by 11 wins late; both programs finish 19-9 overall.
Veteran coaches have a way of sizing up their teams before they’ve even played a game.
That’s certainly true for legendary coaches like Ardrey Kell’s Zoe Bell.
“If you had asked at the beginning of the year if we’d been here and winning the regular season title and winning the tournament title, I don’t know that I would have said yes,” Bell said. “But we worked in practice and got better and better.”
On Wednesday, in the Southwestern 7A/8A Conference volleyball championship match it hosted due an unbeaten 10-0 finish in the regular season, Ardrey Kell continued to impress its coach with a 3-1 victory over East Mecklenburg for the conference tournament title.
“We’ve just been building all year long,” said Bell, who has won more than 800 games as volleyball coach at Providence and Ardrey Kell high schools in her career. She’s coached teams to 17 conference titles, five state championships and four state runner-up finishes.
“When we’re on, we can compete with most teams. And we did well tonight in the first two sets. East brought it to us in the third set,” Bell said. “But a sign of a good team is to bounce back.”
The Knights (19-9), who were 8-7 in early September before winning 11 of their last 13 matches, took the victory 25-15, 25-16, 17-25, 25-14.
Three who made a difference
Moorea Atkins, Ardrey Kell: Junior had the clinching kill of the 25-14 victory for her team-high ninth of the night and she also nine service points
.Alivia Lansden, East Mecklenburg: Senior had six service points in the Eagles’ third set victory; East Mecklenburg (19-9) have the most wins for their program in at least 20 years.
Ella Piedra, Ardrey Kell: Junior had team-high 13 service points and also has six kills.
Notable
— Regular season champion North Mecklenburg (19-5) beat Independence 3-1 to win the Meck Power Six 7A/8A tournament final. Senior Scholar Bates of North Mecklenburg was named tournament MVP.
— Regular season champion Hough beat Myers Park 3-1 to win the Greater Charlotte 7A/8A tournament final.
— Regular season champion Cox Mill beat Hickory Ridge 3-0 to win the Greater Metro 6A/7A tournament final.
— Visiting East Gaston upset unbeaten regular season champion Highland Tech 3-2 to win the Southern Piedmont 2A/3A/4A tournament title.