RIO RANCHO — All the Santa Fe High Demonettes wanted was one more game.
One more game to continue their volleyball season.
One more game to swing momentum permanently their way.
Santa Fe High had the serve and a chance to tie Game 3 at 24 -all, but chance gave away to a harsh reality with one swing from Roswell Goddard’s Mande Hudson. Her kill off the block of Hannah Hargrove gave the Lady Rockets a 25-16, 25-12, 25-23 win in the Class AAAA quarterfinals in the Santa Ana Star Center on Friday morning.
The loss ends Santa Fe High’s season at 19-6, but the ninth-seeded Demonettes held on to a belief they could keep their season going if they could get to a fourth game against the state’s No. 2 seed.
“Those last few points we just kept talking about, ‘Game 4, Game 4,’ ” said Hargrove, the Demonettes’ senior middle hitter. “It was disappointing to lose that.”
Disappointing because Santa Fe High finally found the rhythm it had been missing all morning. The offense moved quickly, and the defense started to dig the Lady Rockets’ hits.
It only took a 16-8 deficit in Game 3 for the Demonettes to find the proper motivation. Kills from Hargrove and Monet Ortega started a quick three-point run to get the competitive fire stirring. It was still 19-13 when Santa Fe High finally caught a break at the net.
Goddard was called for a net violation, something the Demonettes had been called for about six times by that point.
In fact, Hargrove threw her hands up in frustration because she thought the call was on her.
It was a point of contention for some of the Demonettes hitters.
“It definitely took some of our intensity away,” Ortega said. “But I think we did a good job at keeping it up. Calls are calls, and I think we stayed strong.”
Santa Fe High went on a five-point run, with junior Kayla Herrera coming up with two kills and Goddard making some uncharacteristic mistakes.
“When [the Lady Rockets] got it to 16, I told them, ‘Look, they’re celebrating already,’ ” Santa Fe High head coach Sam Estrada said. “I think they thought it was over.”
Herrera’s second kill got the deficit to 20-17 before Goddard regrouped and used a Kaitlyn Quintana ace and a lift call on Demonettes junior Andrea Gonzales to fashion a 24-20 lead.
A pair of Lady Rockets passing errors and an Ortega kill brought the margin to 24-23 before Goddard escaped with the sweep.
But the Lady Rockets were superior to the Demonettes in many aspects. Their defense picked up many of Santa Fe High’s hits, and it matched that with firepower at the net.
Megan Meeks had 8 kills, while Renee Garcia added seven. Shaylee Griffin had only five kills, but she added four blocks.
“When a team on the other side is relentless,” Estrada said, “and keeps coming back at you with tough hits and not just chip shots, it wears at you. I think that’s what got us down until their backs were really against the wall.”
Estrada was impressed with the Lady Rockets’ ability to hit from the back row, which caused his own back row some problems in reacting to their swings.
“They’re very savvy,” Estrada said. “They knew what to do with every missed pass, and every ball they passed off at the 10 foot line, they got good swings.”
This served as the swan song for Santa Fe High at the Class AAAA level. The school will move to AAAAAA next year, which will provide the Demonettes with a new challenge — to compete at the state’s highest level.
Outgoing senior setter Shannon Bates believes the team will continue its ascension in the new class. The team only loses four seniors from a team that won the District 2AAAA Tournament.
“I know they are going to work hard next season, and there isn’t any question they can come back [to the state tournament].”
If only they could have come back for one more game.