MARIE ORTIZ Alex Stein of East Brunswick comes through the middle as Taras Borysyuk puts up the set and Chris Schuller gets set on the left side in the state final against Lakeland on Thursday.
There is no better way to end a season, and certainly no better way to end a career. Six East Brunswick High School senior volleyball players and their coach, Scott Arnauer, are going out on top.
The Bears won their second straight New Jersey State Interscholastic Athletic Association volleyball title with a 15-6, 16-14 sweep of Lakeland Regional, Wanaque, at the College Avenue Gym of Rutgers University, New Brunswick.
The seniors are, of course, graduating, and Arnauer has accepted an administrative post in another district, so his coaching career also is at an end.
"I don’t even know how I’m going to get over not coaching," Arnauer said. "I’m going to miss the guys the most. We have the nicest guys on our team; they make you want to coach."
MARIE ORTIZ Seb DiPietro goes for the kill against Lakeland in the state final on Thursday.
And with Arnauer at the helm, it was clear the Bears wanted to play. In the state final they came out quickly, with the first game being every bit the blowout it appears. East Brunswick methodically built a 7-0 lead and was never in danger of losing control of the game.
The Bears received impressive performances from Mike Ressler (five kills and two blocks) and Ryan Walsh (four kills and a block) in the opener.
Lakeland, behind a dominating performance from George Mason University-bound Brad Kniewel, jumped on the Bears in the second game and appeared to be as much in control of that contest as the Bears had been in the first.
The Lancers led by as much as 7-1 early and were in front by as much as 12-3 in the game, but the Bears managed to chip away at the lead to get back into the game.
The Bears began their comeback when Alex Stein dropped the ball short in the middle for the fourth point and picked up another when Lakeland’s Dan Lattanzi hit into the net.
After a pair of sideouts, Ressler stuffed Lattanzi to make it 6-12, and Stein, who had three kills in the game and six in the match, put away a Taras Borysyuk set to cut the deficit to five.
The Bears and Lancers went back to trading sideouts before Lattanzi hit wide for East Brunswick’s eighth point. East Brunswick made it 9-12 when Lakeland was whistled for having an illegal blocker come from the back row on a spike by Seb DiPietro, who had three kills in the game.
"I turned to my assistant coach and said, ‘Let me know when we get to nine,’ " Arnauer said after the match. "That’s just a random number, but I figured that was a point where we would be close."
The Bears were indeed closer than they had been since any point of the match since the game’s opening minutes when the Lancers started with a 4-0 run.
Arnauer attributed the slow start to the Bears being out of rhythm at the start of the second game.
It was the Lancers who developed rhythm problems after building the big lead. They allowed the Bears to score six straight points before getting back on track by scoring two quick points on East Brunswick miss-hits to get to game-point at 14-9.
The Bears stepped up and got the sideout to get the ball back, but the teams were back to trading sideouts for several rotations.
Facing a loss on each Lakeland serve, East Brunswick saved the first on a Walsh spike; got the next when Chris Schuller, the only junior in the starting lineup for the Bears, pounded one of his five kills in the game; and got the next on the same play after Kniewel had a great dig of yet another driven ball by Schuller.
The Bears finally broke the scoring drought when Walsh easily stuffed Kniewel on an exceptionally tight set to make it 10-14.
East Brunswick cut the margin back to three on an ace serve by Stein and got to 12-14 when Ressler dropped another ball over the block into the middle of the court.
After another hitting error by Lattanzi brought the Bears to 13-14, Schuller blocked a back-row spike attempt by Kniewel to tie the game.
After Lattanzi put one away to get the serve back for the Lancers, Schuller pounded another ball that was nearly dug by Kniewel, but the Lancers couldn’t control it.
The Bears got their first lead of the game when Schuller again rose to the occasion and stuffed another back-row spike from Kniewel to put the Bears up 15-14.
Lakeland got the sideout on the next serve and had a chance to tie, but this time Borysyuk got in on the block party, stuffing Kyle Grunstra hitting in the middle to get the ball back for the Bears.
On the ensuing serve, the Lancers went back to Kniewel hitting from the the back row, but in a replay of the previous point, Schuller blocked it and the Bears had the match.
"This team never gets too low when they’re down or too high when they’re playing well," Arnauer said. "That’s why the comeback happened so slowly."
The Bears faced an almost unheard-of nine game-point serves from the Lancers before tying the game, but as far as Ressler was concerned, the outcome of the match was never in doubt.
"As the game is going, you can feel the momentum, and I knew that even if we didn’t win it in this game, we definitely would come back and win the next one," Ressler said.
Even down 12-3, Arnauer was not ready to concede the game.
"I knew we could come back because we were down 12-4 against Lakeland at the Clifton Tournament and came back to win there," the coach said.
Also, it was clear that Schuller, who had an excellent day blocking all around, was dialed in to Kniewel late.
"I really think my focus before the game brought it out," Schuller said of his blocking.
"He (Kniewel) can get it from anywhere, but I really feel we were so prepared that we were able to deal with that," Schuller added "We usually don’t block (when opponents hit from the ) back row, but Mike and I decided that whenever he was hitting, we would."