By KEVIN POMEROY
Sports Editor
The last few years have been some of the best in program history for the Johnston girls’ volleyball team.
But this year’s performance so far has been, without question, the best.
The Panthers finished up a perfect regular season on Monday with a 3-0 sweep of Mt. Pleasant. Johnston ended up at 16-0, the first time the team has gone unbeaten in its 16 seasons in existence.
Johnston lost just one game all year, early in the season to Shea. Overall in games, it went 48-1.
“We’ve never had that before,” said head coach Greta Lalli. “We’ve never been undefeated. This was history. It’s just an amazing season, start to finish.”
For the third consecutive season, Johnston will open the Division III playoffs as the No. 1 seed. It went 14-2 two years ago before falling in the semifinals, and it lost in the finals last year after a 14-1 showing in the regular season.
Now, the Panthers are the unquestioned favorites for the D-III crown, as the next closest team in the standings is Portsmouth at 12-4.
Johnston will open the postseason at home in a quarterfinal match on Monday or Tuesday, with the time and opponent still to be determined. The likely opponent is Shea.
“It’ll be even more intense,” Lalli said. “Now we’re that much closer. It was one milestone to go undefeated, now we’re working on another milestone to win states. I’m going to be just as tough.”
The Panthers will turn the page on their storybook regular season pretty quickly, as they turn their focus towards winning their second-ever championships.
Yet, Monday was still a fitting way to finish off the unbeaten campaign. Johnston dominated against a one-win Mt. Pleasant team, winning 25-17, 25-14 and 25-12.
The Panthers also celebrated their Senior Night in a ceremony that was understandably emotional, given the recent success of the program and the amount of seniors on the roster.
“It was very emotional,” Lalli said. “Definitely worth the tears. The girls are so amazing. The seniors, they’re refined people. They work hard. They do all that they need to. They’re just amazing.”
Seniors Angela Gallucci, Alexa Tavares, Katherine Rocha, Francesca Gaudiana and Dana Desmarais are all regular contributors and the team’s top players, while Casey Howe is another senior on the roster.
Howe got into the action on Monday, registering four kills.
“She played an amazing,” Lalli said. “It was good that she was able to show what she could do.”
The rest of the team had little trouble showcasing what it could do - and has done all year - as well. Desmarais had three aces and four kills, Gaudiana had five aces and five kills, Tavares had five aces, Gallucci had eight kills and three aces and Kristina DiMascio had four kills.
Johnston probably didn’t play its best, but it didn’t have to, and the result was its 15th-sweep in 16 tries.
The latest it trailed in any game was 5-4 in game two, and it led wire-to-wire in game three. In game one, it trailed only 1-0.
Gaudiana starred in the early going of the first game, serving five consecutive balls that never came back over the net to help give the Panthers a 7-1 lead.
Mt. Pleasant actually came back to get within 15-14, but Johnston won five consecutive points – including a strong serve from Tavares and a kill by DiMascio – to open up a big lead.
In the second game, the score was close, with Johnston leading 8-7, before it won eight of the next 12 points. The outcome was never in doubt from there.
In the third game, with Desmarais serving, Johnston took a quick 5-0 lead and rolled to the win.
“They deserved every single game, every match, every point,” Lalli said.
As magical as the season has already been for Johnston, the team still has unfinished business. It lost a brutal match in the championship last season, and it will be looking for redemption.
It also wants to send out the winningest senior class in the school’s history with a title.
“If they lose, it won’t be because they aren’t talented enough,” Lalli said. “It will be because they were off that day. I don’t worry about one individual person. These girls are amazing.”
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