Sweren Sets Up Mounties for State Title Bid
Monday’s state semi-final win for the Mount Greylock volleyball team featured a lot of big moments.
One of the biggest for Mounties senior hitter Celina Savage came on set point in the second set.
That is when Savage set up teammate Kylie Sweren, who spiked the ball off a Baystate Academy blocker for the kill and the set.
“Oh, my god, I loved that,” Savage said with a huge smile after the win. “Honestly, I’ve just been waiting to do that.
“In practices, sometimes, we’re like, ‘Everyone gets in line to set Kylie.’ Because she is an incredible hitter. And we never get to showcase it. So I said, you know what, ‘I’m just gonna do it.’ I don’t care if I [double hit], she needs one.
“So I’m happy it worked out. It wasn’t a perfect set. It was a good set. I’m happy she was able to put it away, because she’s an incredible hitter. And no one gets to see that. But it’s like a little hidden talent of hers.”
Hidden because, generally, Sweren is the one doing the setting.
This fall, she has quarterbacked a Mount Greylock offense that has seen the team win 24 straight matches heading into Saturday afternoon’s State Championship at Worcester State.
No. 25 will be, perhaps, top-seeded Mount Greylock’s biggest challenge yet. Second-seeded Bourne (20-5) advanced to the final with a 3-0 thrashing of Western Mass Class D Champion Turners Falls by scores of 25-16, 25-14, 25-14.
One more time, Sweren will have a chance to distribute the ball to hitters like Savage, who was named to the all-state team this week, Julia DeChaine and Jackie Brannan.
“Kylie’s serve is an attack,” said Brannan, who, like DeChaine, was named to the Western Massachusetts All-Star team this week. “It is offensive. It is good. Every single time I go to the front row and she goes back, I know it’s going to be a bullet.
“We really depend on her to do that, and she delivers.”
While Savage grabs a lot of the headlines – and justifiably so – Sweren has been on the front end of most of the senior swinger’s nearly 400 kills this season and then some.
“She’s running the offense,” Mount Greylock coach Greg Geyer said. “She’s got 550-plus assists. … She almost made the all-state team. They just wouldn’t allow us to take two kids, so Celina’s on the all-state team.
“Kylie is huge. She’s solid and she’s calm. And she’s just always there.”
Savage, for one, is glad that she is.
“How do I start?” she said when asked to talk about her teammate. “Her serves. Her sets. She is one of the most skilled ball control players on this team, by far. She has incredible ball control, incredible mental focus. And oftentimes, she’s the reason we can get so many balls in, so many balls back into play so we can focus on the next thing.
“She is vital. I mean, there are so many people who are vital on our team. But Kylie, since Day 1, in the pre-season, you could tell, she was focused on, ‘How can I better the ball with my hands? How can I better the ball with my platform? Whatever. She’s vital. Key. K-e-y.”
Tickets to Saturday’s Division 5 State Championship Match at Worcester State University are available here.