Shelby volleyball falls short to Ravenna in close district matchup

SHELBY — Shelby coach McKenna Peters expected a well-matched battle Monday night against Ravenna in the first round of districts, and that's exactly what the Tigers got. Unfortunately, a few key errors late in game one helped get Ravenna into the lead, and the Bulldogs won a close match, 25-23, 20-25, 25-23, 25-19.

A key sequence was in the third game. The Tigers had put together an excellent second game to tie the match at one game apiece after Ravenna had pulled out a close opening win, and a clutch kill by Briar Peters put Shelby up 23-22 in game three. The opportunity was there to jump ahead 2-1 and really put the pressure on the Bulldogs.

Unfortunately, Ravenna scored the final three points of the game, all on Tiger errors - a service error, then a net violation, then an attacking error. The Bulldogs led through most of game four and were able to hold off a late Shelby charge to complete the win.

"I think that the whole conversation that we had coming into tonight was to be aggressive and to swing hard," Peters said. "We knew they had big middles. We knew that they had a great defense, so we knew that we had to be aggressive to go out there and score. I think that we just got a little bit too aggressive with sets that maybe weren't there that we needed to do something else with."

Peters told her team to tweak their offensive strategy and force Ravenna's setter to make plays on the ball during one timeout, and the team responded. Unfortunately, the Bulldogs were able to make a counter-adjustment and keep Shelby at bay.

It was another good night for the Tiger defense, maybe the team's strongest point all year. With Ravenna throwing impressive attacks at Shelby all night, the back row for the Tigers came up with some great digs that kept their team in the game. Brylee Friedman led the defense with 26 digs, and Briar Peters added 25. Kylie Brown and Peyton Rapes posted 21 digs each.

"We've consistently played really, really well on defense and had a lot of girls who are just putting up really great dig numbers game after game," coach Peters said. "I thought our defense was incredible tonight, but unfortunately their defense was just as good."

In game two, Friedman and Brown delivered late serves to help their team tie the match at a game each; Friedman scored an ace to end that game, one of her team-high four. At one point in game two, Brown and Ariana Garza teamed up on a remarkable save on a ball near the bench that was difficult to play, and the Tigers scored a point on that rally thanks to a net violation by Ravenna.

On offense, Peters scored 16 kills and Brown had 13, posting a .306 hitting percentage. Rapes had an impressive 44 assists.

It was the last Shelby match for seniors Friedman, Brown and Garza, who were not just among the team's best players but were respected leaders. Peters said it was their buying into her coaching in her first season taking over for her own former coach, Tom Weirich, that helped the Tigers enjoy the success they did in 2025.

"When you get a new head coach as a senior after you've played three years under a different coach running a different program, it can be a super hard transition," Peters said. "They made that transition super seamless. They came in and they respected me from day one, and they bought into what I was trying to do. I think because they were able to do that, our whole team was able to, and so they made that transition super easy.

"I'm super grateful that they were the first group of seniors that I had. They were great leaders."