Franklin hopes to continue its postseason journey after winning its first sectional title since 2011.
Daily Journal file photo
Jennifer Hawk can’t remember a single instance during her volleyball coaching career when she’s had to play against the same opponent four times in the same season.
The Center Grove coach might get to venture into that uncharted territory on Saturday evening.
Hawk’s Trojans and Franklin both won sectional titles last weekend to earn their way into the Class 4A Bloomington North Regional, and the two county rivals could potentially see one another in the championship match after having already faced off three times during the regular season.
Of course, each side has other business to take care of first. The Grizzly Cubs play an 11 a.m. semifinal match against No. 5 Castle, while the eighth-ranked Trojans take on Floyd Central in the second semi.
Whether it’s the Grizzly Cubs or any other team on the opposite side of the net, Hawk knows her team needs to be sharp come regional time.
“At that point, everybody is at their best,” she said. “They got there for a reason; they’re kind of at the top of their game. So it’s really just us trying to focus on limiting errors on our side, focusing on their strengths, slowing those down. Finding points where we can absolutely control that part of the game, and controlling emotions in times that you can’t.”
Center Grove (26-5) can at least bank on experience this time around. Most of the players in the current lineup got a taste of regional experience last fall, and they’re carrying that “been there, done that” confidence into this weekend.
Franklin’s rotation players, likewise, are mostly in at least their second season — and even though this is the school’s first regional appearance since 2011, many of those players have been in high-pressure situations in other sports. Seniors Scarlett Kimbrell and Brooklyn York both saw action in a state championship basketball game two years ago, and junior Aubrey Runyon medaled at the state track meet this past spring. Setter Kennedy Urban and defensive specialist Kate Pinnick were both part of the Grizzly Cubs’ state semifinalist tennis team. The moment shouldn’t be too big for any of them.
Castle (31-3), on the other hand, is pretty big, with size and length throughout its lineup.
“They’re long at every position,” Franklin coach Pat Carlson said of the Knights. “They’re 6 foot, 6 foot, 6 foot, 6 foot. There’s nobody you can say, ‘Okay, you can set it over here, because they’re small’ or whatever.”
For the Trojans, much of the prep work for Saturday will be internally focused. Hawk has done plenty of tape-watching on all three potential opponents, but for her it mainly boils down to taking care of home.
“A lot of it is just focused on us and what we can fix, and what we can get better at,” Hawk said. “I kind of think of it on the flip side — what are they going to look at to pick on for us, and how do we fix it now?”
The Grizzly Cubs have their own internal work to do in terms of incorporating one of their main pieces back into the puzzle. Sophomore Rose Mahin, the team leader in kills per set, missed the sectional while on a school trip to Japan over fall break; Carlson said one of his primary challenges this week will be seamlessly reintegrating Mahin without losing any of what was gained in her absence.
“It does give us more options, which is really nice,” he said.
A semifinal win is not a given for either Franklin or Center Grove — but a championship meeting between the two would obviously be the most compelling option, especially locally.
It would also be the most fitting, given the extensive recent history.
Franklin held the upper hand in the series during the early 2010s, winning the aforementioned sectional in 2011 and taking both 2013 meetings, including a four-set triumph in the county tournament. Center Grove took control of the rivalry after that, taking 22 consecutive matches from the Grizzly Cubs between 2014 and 2021 — but even during that stretch, it was seldom easy. Franklin pushed four matches to five sets, and even jumped out to a 2-0 lead in two of those; the Trojans dropped nine sets and won 16 others by the minimum two points.
The Grizzly Cubs finally snapped their dry spell of almost nine years with two victories last fall before Center Grove got even with a sweep in the Johnson County final.
The Trojans have taken all three meetings so far this season, but none have been sweeps, and Franklin (23-8) won the first set in two of them. And perhaps no match has been as indicative of the rivalry as this year’s first regular-season clash on Aug. 31. The Grizzly Cubs took the first set, 25-23, before the Trojans battled back to edge the next two by scores of 27-25 and 37-35 en route to a four-set win that felt more like seven sets.
Both teams have work to do in order to make a fourth chapter a reality, but they’re not oblivious to the possibility, either. Franklin might be plenty familiar with Center Grove and vice versa, but there will still be some practice time devoted to one another this week.
“The biggest thing against Center Grove is making sure you can defend all their options,” Carlson said. “They have two really good lefts (Sophia Sabol and Ellen Zapp), and two pretty good middles (Reese Dunkle and Ava Mardis) that are bigger than anybody I can throw out there. So we’re hoping that we can come up with an idea or two and spend a day on it at practice. We’ve got five days this week; we can do that.”
In the end, though, all of those practice days will get boiled down to one day of match play. Four teams will show up in Bloomington, and only one team will leave town with a trophy in hand, whether we see Center Grove-Franklin IV or not.
“The tournament has a funny way of, some people step up, some people shrink down,” Carlson said, “and all we can do is hope that our side is the one that steps up.”
IF YOU GO
Class 4A Bloomington North Regional
Castle (31-3) vs. Franklin (23-8), 11 a.m.
Floyd Central (23-10) vs. Center Grove (26-5), 1 p.m.
Championship, 7 p.m.
