East Mountain Volleyball Regroups to Top Oak Grove in Four Sets

SANDIA PARK, N.M. — The East Mountain Lady Timberwolves rebounded from a third-set stumble to defeat Oak Grove Classical Academy 3-1 in a nondistrict volleyball matchup Thursday at the Vista Grande Community Center.

East Mountain took the match with set scores of 25-15, 25-23, 15-25, 25-10.

The Lady Timberwolves (4-3) controlled the opening frame and held off a late push by the Owls (5-2) to secure a two-set cushion. Oak Grove seized momentum in the third, jumping out to an early lead and capitalizing on extended rallies to take the set 25-15.

Between sets, East Mountain coach Claire Rose refocused her squad on emotional composure and regaining command of the match’s tempo.

“So much of it is about energy, and we have such a fun and funny group of girls. They’re totally nuts,” Rose said. “So we have to harness that energy where we are excited, but we’re not crazy. And also, we don’t go the opposite end of the spectrum where we are getting too far in our heads. So, what we talked about was finding the joy.”

The message paid immediate dividends in the fourth set. Backed by solid serving that disrupted the Owls’ offense, the Lady Timberwolves established firm control at the net behind the front-line play of Calla DiMaio, Alynna Cook, Skylar Graff, and Olivia Gonzales. The quartet repeatedly turned back Oak Grove attacks and dictated the pace during long rallies to close out the 25-10 clincher.

“That’s been our mantra, that we are recognizing that when we can control the pace of the game with serves, we can compete with anybody,” Rose said. “We had lots of really good rallies with them that didn’t quite go our way because we were wanting to go too fast. So we had to talk about … it’s okay to remember that we can still control the pace on our side, even if that means that we have to slow it down a little bit. And I feel like they did a really good job with that.”

East Mountain’s lineup also featured contributions from Henley Hatley, Bella Rae Winnicki, Ada Hansen, Evelyn Salberg, and Sonya Gonzales.