Taking the long road trip to Waterbury on Saturday, Deerfield defeated Taft, 3-0.
It was Taft’s last home match of the year so we opened with a quick ceremony to honor the seniors on both teams before starting the 1st set. Deerfield started a bit sloppy and Taft took advantage, getting out to a 0-3 and then 3-5 lead before Deerfield started to chip away to take the lead at 9-8. That brought Daphne Gavros ‘22 to the service line where she extended the lead to 12-8 followed by another service run from Caroline Weller ‘23 to take the score to 20-10. Some errors from Deerfield and smart play from Taft tightened up the score and Deerfield took the first set, 25-19.
The second set had a similar feel with some good service runs (this time from Aoife Bruce ‘22 and Elle Stearns ‘23) as well as too many hitting and passing errors from Deerfield. With some great pressure passing from Emily Rice ‘24, our middles started to connect and it was a nicely placed shot from Georgia Sackrey ‘23 that finished the set at 25-22.
The third set saw Aoife Bruce put down a number of kills from the middle and Cate Shanahan ‘23 had good hits from the outside. Zoe Gavros ‘23 stepped to the service line at 8-6 and proceeded to serve strong to extend the lead to 15-6. Credit to Taft for their strong serves that kept the match tight. Deerfield was able to win the final set, 25-21.
Deerfield hosts three matches in the final week of the regular season, starting with NMH on Monday at 4:30pm in the Barn.