Northport’s volleyball team finished as co-champions in the Cherryland Conference after a league meet Monday evening.

By beating Grand Traverse Academy and losing to Traverse City Christian Monday, the Wildcats finished in a tie with Sabres for the league crown.

It is Northport’s first conference volleyball championship in at least nine years.

While Buckley canceled its match at Northport Tuesday night, Wildcat coach Kristi Fischer said the Wildcats saw plenty of action on Monday at T-C Christian. “We played volleyball for three hours straight Monday night. It seemed like every volley went on forever,” she said.

Northport beat the G-T Academy, 20-25, 25-22, 25-23, 19-25, 15-8, but lost to T-C Christian, 19-25, 18- 25, 25-21, 25-27. The Wildcats and Sabres finished at 3-1, with the Mustangs third at 0-4.

For Northport, Emily Stowe had a consistent evening with 28 kills and 31 blocks. Also, Bryton Collins had 20 kills, 21 blocks; Dylan Burgaurd had 10 kills; Kelly Fischer had 65 assists; and Nina Muller had 53 assists.

“We didn’t just take them to nine games, we took them to nine games to the max,” Fischer said.
The Wildcats hosted the Traverse City Bulldogs on Thursday and won, 25-22, 25-21, 25-17. Fischer said she didn’t have an assistant available to take statistics for the game.
SAMMIE NOWAK celebrates a tip-over point during the second set against T-C Christian Tuesday night. Nowak was one of six seniors honored at Leland’s final home match of the regular season.
The Christian volleyball team came into Leland’s gym Tuesday night and saw an awful lot of pink. The Comets hosted the Sabres and held a Dig Pink Breast Cancer fundraiser event. The Sabres were swept by the Comets, 25-13, 25-16, 25-24.

Longtime program volunteer Jane Lang organized the Dig Pink benefit. “We raised $520 for breast cancer research. Half will go to the Dig Pink Foundation and half will go to Munson’s mammography program,” Lang said yesterday morning.

Wearing pink competition jerseys, Leland had to battle from behind as T-C Christian held a 7-4 advantage early in the first set. The Comets finished the set with two big kills from senior Samantha “Sammie” Nowak. Leland then cruised to the second and third set wins.

“It was a really great atmosphere in the gym Tuesday night. There was a lot of pink in the gym and the community really came out to support us,” said Leland coach Beth Osorio.

For the night Sarah Ruszel had 11 kills, 12 digs, 2 aces; Nowak had 10 kills, 10 blocks, 1 ace; Tantzi Snyder had 10 kills, 1 block, 3 aces; Elizabeth McKee had 4 kills, 2 aces; Hannah Schaub had 31 assists, 4 digs, 5 aces; and Melissa Loredo had 7 digs.

Northport will wrap up the regular season today against Bellaire, while Leland will compete at a four-team meet at Suttons Bay today.