Glacier tops No. 1 Helena

Helena High rolled into Kalispell on Thursday with the Class AA No. 1 volleyball ranking and the most celebrated middle hitter in Class AA.

Monica Grimsrud did her thing - 25 kills and three blocks.

But Glacier's young middle hitters more than held their own.

Freshman Cassidy Hashley led the Wolfpack with 14 kills and sophomore Tiffany Marks had four blocks as No. 3-ranked Glacier rallied from a two-set deficit to claim a thrilling five-set victory. Scores were 14-25, 23-25, 25-19, 25-17, 15-11.

The win brings the Wolfpack (7-2) right up with the first place Bengals (8-2) in Western AA.

The biggest moment of the match was Marks versus Grimsrud at 9-9 in the fifth set.

Grimsrud took her swing, but Marks picked that moment to get the biggest block of her young volleyball career.

When the dust settled, Grimsrud was sliding on her bottom into Helena's back row, the ball was on the ground on Helena's side of the court and the Wolfpack was up one point.

"You just have to find (Grimsrud) and stay with her. That was our plan. If (the ball) goes outside the other people can dig it. We just depended on each other," Marks said.

But that particular block?

"I don't even really remember it. But it carried us all the way I think," Marks said.

"I just remember going up. It wasn't an easy block. I just went up like normal and I was in the right place at the right time."

Senior setter Paige Latimer followed that with a service ace. Helena took an immediate time out - and Grimsrud had two more kills - but by then the Wolfpack had captured the momentum.

"I think the momentum, the extra boost of energy just gets to you," Marks said.

"I thought Tiffany did a good job in the middle, taking away some areas of the court," said Glacier coach Christy Harkins. "She took up some court, helped us out on defense.

"That was very thrilling. That was exciting," Harkins said.

"I knew we were in good shape when Marks went back to serve," she said.

The rotation meant that senior libero Cami Mathison had to come out.

Mathison had 35 digs in the match.

"Cami came running off the floor yelling ‘I don't want to go out. I don't want to go out,'" Harkins smiled.

"She wanted be out there, be a part of that."

"It was a great match.I loved the intensity of the match. We were definitely laying it out, leaving everything on the court. I loved it. Loved every point," Mathison said.

"We knew that if we got this, we're tied for first in the conference, so we just started going," she said.

"We got that extra burst right at the end," she said.

Things didn't start out that way. Glacier dropped the first game 25-14.

"I didn't feel like we were playing that poorly," Harkins said.

"We were just letting them go on three-point runs. We were doing things all right, but we just weren't doing things consistently well enough against a team like that. You got to stay point for point with them.

"We knew it was a big important match. That could have caused us to come out a little nervous or apprehensive," Harkins said.

"We had the whole pink distraction thing (breast cancer awareness). We talked about it all week to not be distracted but it took us awhile to get those nerves out and to get going," the coach said.

"We had little communication errors, a little hesitation," Mathison said.

"As soon as we got that figured out it was good," she said.

The Wolfpack did much better in the second game - it was point-for-point with the Bengals. Helena squeaked out that win and led the third game 3-1.

But the Wolfpack turned it around fast.

"We just came together," Marks said.

"Our serving picked up. We were much more aggressive with our serving," Harkins explained.

Kills - Helena 46 (Monica Grimsrud 25), Glacier 51 (Cassidy Hashley 15), Assists - Helena 44 (Kyndal Williams 40), Glacier 42 (Paige Latimer 39), Blocks - Helena 8 (Grimsrud 3), Glacier 7 (Tiffany Marks 4), Digs - Helena 92 (Williams 18), Glacier 111 (Cami Mathison 35), Aces - Helena 4 (Brianne Benson 2), Glacier 11 (Mathison 4).