Lakeville North continued its stellar volleyball season this morning at Xcel Energy Center, sweeping Centennial 25-14, 25-14, 25-14 (wow, that was easy ...) in the Class 3A state semifinals. The Panthers (30-1) advance to Saturday evening's championship match against either Wayzata or Waconia. The 'W' match is about 10 minutes away.
Lakeville North's victory can be traced back to the first set. After Alyssa Goehner's kill made it a 12-12 match, Whitney Abrahamson took the ball and refused to give it away. She served for 14 straight points before an attack error by Goehner finally stopped the bleeding. By then, though, the set was clearly in the Panthers' favor and they cruised from there.
Centennial (30-3), the No. 4 seed, hit exactly .000 for the match: 25 kills, 25 errors. North, meanwhile, hummed along at a .341 clip led again Goehner (14 kills) and Taylr McNeil (12). Both are freshmen, and will be relied upon heavily tomorrow in the championship. It will be the Panthers' sixth berth in the title match (four as Lakeville, two as Lakeville North). They have never won.
Onward we go to the second Class 3A semifinal. Stay tuned.
