The Pine Bush volleyball team spent most of Sunday morning trailing the Monroe-Woodbury Crusaders.

Still, they were able to split the first four sets before building a lead and winning the fifth set, as the Bushmen won the Section 9 Class AA championship at James I. O’Neill High school with a 3-2 win over the Crusaders.

“This is amazing,” senior setter Alandra Hasbrouck said. “I feel like the section championship is back where it has to be, at Pine Bush.”

That doesn’t mean Pine Bush didn’t struggle to get there, as they fell behind the Crusaders early in the first four sets, but the fifth set was different.
Even though the set was tied at three separate occasions, Pine Bush never trailed as they took the fifth set, 25-18.

“I think everybody was expecting to win, but not in a cocky way,” senior libero Jersey Jones said. “I think we lived up to our expectations.”

The Crusaders were at times, stronger at the net, as Pine Bush is a shorter team. Their tallest player is Sienna Hunter at 5-11 but were able to force the Crusaders into hitting errors, and in the fifth set, limited long service runs.

“Every team coming in wants to be that team and they just work hard and they fight hard,” Pine Bush coach Melyssa Amelio said. “And they work hard every day on the things that we can control. I tell them all the time to ‘take care of your side. We can’t worry about what happens there.’ I’m so proud of them.”

Pine Bush trailed the first set by as many as four points before tying the set at 19-19 with Hunter at the service line. The Crusaders hit the net to give Pine Bush a lead, giving Pine Bush the lead for good as they built a 24-19 lead after a block by Kaeli Murtagh.

Monroe-Woodbury closed the set to two points before a service error by Sophia Ryan gave Pine Bush the win in the first set, 25-22.

The Crusaders built a 9-point lead in the second set, but Pine Bush fought back to tie the set at 21-21, and then took a one-point lead on a kill by Murtagh. However, Monroe-Woodbury scored four of the next five points to win the second set, 25-23 and tie the match.

Things looked immediately bleak in the third set when a long service run by Monroe-Woodbury’s Jordan Ader as the Crusaders took a 6-0 lead.

“You’re always behind and you’re always chasing but it puts a fire under your butt to get you going.”
Pine Bush did get going and fought back to tie the set at 13-13 on an ace by Hunter, and then took the lead for good on a kill by Murtagh, when Jones stepped to the service line.

“I was actually nervous,” Jones said. “But if I just do everything I’m supposed to, I know that it’ll work out.”
And it did.

When Monroe-Woodbury’s Madison Tinger’s kill knocked her off the service line, Pine Bush had just held a four-point lead, it’s highest of the day, and they ran off to a 25-18 win in the third set.

Pine Bush fell behind early in the fourth set, fought back to tie it at 16-16, 17-17, and 23-23 before Monroe-Woodbury’s Payton Grove tipped one into an empty space to give Monroe-Woodbury the lead for good in a set they won 25-23.

That set up a final set. Winner take all.

Pine Bush won it.

“We had had to be confident and play our game and don’t worry about them,” Hasbrouck said. “We knew they were going to try to switch stuff up because they were getting nervous because they want to win. We have to say confident and play our game.”

Pine Bush, who reached the finals with a 3-0 win over Valley Central on Thursday, will now take their game to Saturday’s New York State Public High School Athletic Association Class AA regional final against the winner Section 1 champion North Rockland and Section 4 champion Horseheads.

Last year’s state championships were canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. A win Saturday will send them to the state Final Four on Nov. 20 and 21 at the Cool Insuring Arena in Glens Falls.

“We’re absolutely going to give our 110 percent effort to try to get to states again,” Jones said.