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For the fourth consecutive year the North Penn-Liberty Lady Mounties claimed gold at the PIAA District IV Class AA Volleyball championships.

In a rematch of last year’s AA final, Liberty beat rival Wellsboro 3-1 to run their win streak to 19 games on the season.

“I’m so proud of the girls,” Liberty coach Jennifer Nawri said. “They worked so hard tonight, they deserve this.”

Both teams traded points early in the first set before Charisma Grega kills pushed the lead to 13-10 in favor of the Lady Mounties. Liberty then rattled off 6 straight points to push the 19-10. Liberty kept rolling as they took the set 25-16.

Wellsboro did, however, do what no other NTL team was able to do all season long… win a set against Liberty.

The Lady Hornets started out with a quick 3-1 lead in the second, only to have the Lady Mounties tie and take a 5-4 lead. Both teams remained evenly matched until midway through as the Lady Mounties held a slight 18-15 lead.

That’s when Wellsboro Caitlyn Callahan took over. Callahan scored 5 straight points (4 kills and 1 block) to help Wellsboro retake the lead at 20-18 before the closed out the set with a 25-20 win.

“We talked about what we need to learn from that and what we needed to do to not have that same result,” Nawri continued. “We talked about positioning on defense, ways we could get more touches on the block, and some strategy on where to place our serves and hits. It was a great learning opportunity and we used it.”

And use it they did. Liberty came out and completely dominated the third set. The Lady Mounties built an 8-2 lead early on, Wellsboro eventually cut the lead to 9-5, but that’s as close as they would get. Liberty went on to win the set 25-8 putting them up 2 sets to 1.

Liberty again jumped back out to an early lead in the fourth set but eventually the Lady Hornets battled back to tie it at 8-all on a Bailey Monks kill. The teams traded points again as Wellsboro again tied the set up at 10-10, then later at 14-14 on a Callahan kill, and again at 16-16 on a Breighanna Kemp kill.

The Lady Mounties then went on a 9-4 run down the stretch to secure the set win, 25-20, and the match.

For Wellsboro, Callahan had 28 kills and 5 points, Ryann Adams had 23 digs, Megan Starkweather had 20 assists, 14 digs, and 9 points, and Kemp had 17 assists and 6 points.

Minyo finished with 17 Points, 15 kills, and 13 digs, Ali Koval had 8 points and 27 digs, Grega had 13 kills, 2 blocks, and 13 digs, and Grace Tice had 13 kills and 9 blocks.

Next up for North Penn-Liberty is the District II champion at Athens Area High School on Tuesday, November 5. Wellsboro ends their season at 18-4 overall (12-2 NTL Large School Division).