The Mount St. Joseph Academy volleyball team raised its record to 7-0 last Monday afternoon with a 3-0 victory over visiting St. Basil Academy (5-2). Although the match was decided in straight sets, it was not a cakewalk for the Magic.

"St. Basil is a solid squad and they know what they're doing," noted MSJ head coach Amy Bergin.

All six of the Magic's previous victories had ended at 3-0, as well.

Bergin said that the only brief lapses within a match occur when her players become over-competitive and lose focus.

"When they relax and play their game with energy, they're hard to stop," she observed. "They know what they're doing right and what they're doing wrong. The volleyball IQ of these girls is extremely high; they need guidance more than coaching."

In the recent St. Basil bout, the Magic stepped out in front early on, 8-4, and then doubled up the visitors again at 14-7. From there Mount St. Joe pulled away to an 11-point victory. The wins in the next two sets would not come as easily, with St. Basil reaching 20 points each time before the Mounties sealed the victory.

A kill by junior Liv Esposito started the home team off in the second set. The Panthers stayed reasonably close up to 8-5, then had to call time-out a little later when a block by Esposito and Georgia Pickett put the Magic up 12-6. St. Basil quickly closed up the score to 13-10, getting a few good blocks of its own.

The Mount spread the score out again, but the visitors collected four points in a row (one on a true service ace) and once more were back within three points, now at 19-16.

"We'll occasionally have a little four or five-point stretch where we lose focus," Coach Bergin said, "but usually the girls are able to fix things on the fly. They have a lot of pride in the way they play, so I don't have to be hard on them because they're hard on themselves."

A hit from the right side of the front row by MSJ senior Viviana Carrasco ended the Panthers' run, but the hosts still had to work hard to lock up the 25-20 victory.

Once the third set got underway the score was tied nine times as the score seesawed up to 12-12, then three straight kills gave the Panthers a 15-12 lead. It took the Mount a few minutes to draw even again at 16-16 with a scoring tip by sophomore outside Daphne Mond. The 10th-grader then scored on a hit and another tip for a two-point Magic advantage.

St. Basil got one point back, then the Mounties made it 22-17 with a four-point surge consisting of a kill by Carrasco, a hit out over the baseline by the Panthers, and two unreturned serves by Magic junior Ashleigh Hopkins.

After a few more exchanges, the visitors had fought back to within three points of the Mount at 23-20. The Magic secured a key side-out when a clever cross-court push by junior M.K. Fielke confounded the Panthers. This brought up game point, and on the Mount serve by Carrasco St. Basil's hit the ball into the net on the return to end the match.