By Mike London
mike.london@salisburypost.com

SALISBURY — Salisbury High’s Matt Armstrong is getting his feet wet as a volleyball coach at a challenging time.

The expanded Central Carolina Conference got considerably tougher with Ledford, South Rowan, North Davidson and Central Davidson all moving down to 2A this fall. Those four schools form 80 percent of the top half of the CCC standings, along with perennial beast West Davidson, which has taken 10 CCC titles in the last dozen years.

Besides starting over with a rookie coach in a tougher league, Salisbury also is facing life without the automatic kills of Juliana Anderson, county and conference player of the year when the Hornets won a CCC championship in 2014. Graduating alongside Anderson last spring were All-CCC players Abby Lee, who made impossible digs look routine, and Katie Bullock, a special athlete.

Still, the Hornets have been winning the matches they’re supposed to win and competing in the ones that they aren’t. Monday’s match was a supposed-to-win affair against visiting Lexington. The Hornets took care of business with a sweep: 25-22, 25-16 and 25-14.

“I’ve been very fortunate as a first-time coach, not only to have a good group of girls, but to have some experienced players who can help the younger ones,” Armstrong said. “It’s been a good situation. It’s a learning process for all of us, but we’re getting better.”

Salisbury (6-7, 5-7 CCC) really struggled in Monday’s first set and had to rely more on Lexington mistakes than its own positive plays. Salisbury had just two kills in the first set, with senior middle hitter Mary McCullough and senior setter Kaya Twitty getting one each. Senior Alayjiah Dumas and freshman Ellen Yang had aces.

“The slow starts — that’s been the biggest hurdle for us,” Armstrong said.

It was 20-all in the first set after a kill by Lexington’s Hevan Sparks gave the Yellow Jackets three straight points. Lexington was fired up and the Hornets appeared to be in some trouble, but after Armstrong called a timeout, the Hornets regrouped, refocused and took the set.

It helped that Lexington missed a serve right after the timeout. Then McCullough and junior Lila Harry teamed for the Hornets’ most critical play of the day, a momentum-turning combo block for a 22-20 lead.

“We were messing up a lot, but we kept a good attitude,” the versatile Harry said. “We did a good job of staying within ourselves and didn’t let a bad play affect the next one.”

The second set was a little easier. It was 9-all when Yang served for five straight Salisbury points, including her second ace of the match. That broke it open. McCullough had three kills in the set. Carsyn Parrot contributed two. Harry had one.

“It normally takes us that whole first set to warm up,” McCullough said. “But we kept working together, and then we got it going. When our passing improved, Kaya was able to make good sets. Then we got some kills.”

The third set was the strongest for the Hornets. Abigail Lund’s ace for a 4-3 lead put the Hornets ahead to stay. Salisbury got eight kills in that set from six different players. McCullough had three to finish the day with a team-high seven, while Harry, Twitty, Parrott, Judea White and Sydney Edwards produced one each. It was the ultimate team effort.

“Kaya had a really good day setting,” Harry said. “Mary (McCullough) and Ellen (Yang) did a good job of passing and we started connecting on a lot of balls.”

Lexington dropped to 6-11 overall and 2-10 in the 10-team CCC, but the springy Yellow Jackets looked like a dangerous team. They got a fistful of kills from senior Chalayah Clark and four aces from tall sophomore Jordan Biesecker.

“They are scary,” Armstrong said. “They’re athletic and they’re scrappy and they’ve gotten a lot better since the first time we saw them.”

Salisbury won 3-1 at Lexington on Aug. 29. Salisbury is at Central Davidson tonight.