Mount St. Mary defeats Valley View in five set thriller for 5A volleyball championship

HOT SPRINGS -- Mount St. Mary needed all five sets to win its first volleyball state championship. The Belles took down perennial power Valley View 16-25, 25-16, 26-24, 20-25, 15-12 to claim the Class 5A title Saturday at Bank OZK Arena. Written on the wrists of every Mount St. Mary player was the mantra "I'm not nervous. I'm ready," which Belles Coach Olivia Stroud said she believes propelled her team to the win. She said the goal of the mantra was for her team to not get caught up in the moment, as the state championship game was somewhere that none of them had been. Mount St. Mary junior Taylor Wherry, who was named the tournament MVP, had 27 kills and two blocks. She credited her success to her relationship with not just her setters, but the entire team. "I think I just had really good people to build me up, and I had a lot of training with (the) club and school," Wherry said. "I have my best friends as setters, so they know where to put the ball and I can tell them what to do." While Wherry picked apart the Valley View defense, the Belles' block defense shut down hitters across the court. As a team, Mount St. Mary finished with 18 blocks, including six by junior Marley Bagby, who also had 14 kills. Stroud said preparing to block Valley View was a challenge, but her team adjusted. "Through our scouting and stuff, we tried to watch and adjust, but that team was really good," Stroud said. "They kept on changing their shots, changing their angles. That team was very middle heavy, and it was very hard to adjust to. I'll say that." Making those adjustments was key for the Belles, playing strong defense and forcing Valley View out of its system. Valley View, which has won 16 state titles, was stunned by the Mount St. Mary response. Mount St. Mary rallied for five straight points to win the third set 26-24. From that point, the match remained tight, with Valley View pulling away to force a fifth set. With it being a new stage for Stroud and the Belles, she said she wanted her players to fight, but would've been proud either way. "Honestly, today we just said going in, 'We've written our paper, we've written our sentence, and this is just like the exclamation point at the end of this sentence,' " Stroud said. "You just want to do it, you just want to finish, and that was just our mentality today was just to finish the game the best we could. And when we were down, when we were up, I don't think we ever tried to just let down. I think we always tried to put that exclamation point at the end of everything constantly." Wherry said the knowledge that no matter what, the fifth set was the last one the team would play together motivated them on the court. "It was definitely scary," Wherry said. "Like it was our last set of the whole season. It was the seniors' last set ever. But I think we just truly came together because we wanted it so bad, and we just really we proved ourselves. We really wanted it, and we showed that because we fought so hard in the fifth set, in every set really, and it really it showed." With the win, this team cements itself into the history books of Mount St. Mary athletics, and it did it with a large cheering section behind it. A large group of students from Mount St. Mary and Little Rock Catholic made the trip to support the Belles, which Wherry said they've done all season. "It honestly makes us so happy," Wherry said. "We're always asking people to come to our games, and when they did, it was the best thing ever. We loved having them there."