Underdog Gulliver Prep volleyball returns to state after denying Pine Crest payback

So much for a rebuilding season.

Having lost nearly every starter off last year’s state championship team including Miami Herald Player of the Year Jackie Taylor, the 2024 season was one where the Gulliver Prep girls’ volleyball team unveiled virtually all new faces and would try to start rebuilding a championship caliber team.

It looks like coach Emilio Rodriguez and his coaching staff might be just a little ahead of schedule.

The Raiders traveled to northeast Fort Lauderdale for Tuesday night’s Region 4-3A final as an underdog against a top-seeded Pine Crest team that was returning virtually its entire squad from a year ago, one that saw them drop a four-set heartbreaker to Gulliver in the Raiders’ gym in the very same round and a team that was out to avenge that loss.

But there would be no revenge for Pine Crest as the Panthers, after winning the first set, saw Gulliver settle down and beat them three straight sets to record a 3-1 (23-25, 25-23, 25-20, 25-21) victory to advance to the state final four for the second straight year.

After winning the program’s first ever state title a year ago in Class 4A as the top seed in 2023, the Raiders dropped down a classification this year and will take on the role of underdog again then they challenge Orlando Lake Highland Prep in a 3A state semifinal at Polk State College in Winter Haven next Tuesday at either 10 a.m. or 1 p.m.

“There’s no pressure on us, we’re not defending anything,” Rodriguez said. “We’ve been embracing the underdog role all season long. We won a state title last year but that was a completely different team that was playing as a favorite. This year, maybe nobody watches film on us and maybe they don’t take us that seriously but maybe they should now.”

Rodriguez can probably thank his senior captain, Julia Rose-Rivera, one of those few returning players from last year’s team, for playing a big part in the Raiders pulling off the upset on Tuesday night.

Rivera led the way with 15 kills including the game-clinching winner to close out the 25-21 win in the fourth set. But it was what Rose-Rivera did in between the first and second set that really impressed Rodriguez.

With no coaches, she held a “players-only” huddle to try and settle her teammates down following the first set loss. Evidently they listened as the Raiders, who started off the season 0-5 and have now won 18 of their last 20 games to improve to 18-7, took control of the match.

They took early leads in each of the next three sets and never allowed the Panthers to gain any kind of real momentum. Whenever Pine Crest (17-8) would put a small run together, Gulliver would answer with a small one its own to keep small leads.

“I just told them to stay focused. and stay composed and that our energy would dictate the match,” said Rose-Rivera of her little impromptu pep talk to her team. “I reminded them that we had been in these spots before including the regional semifinal last week (when Ransom Everglades also won the first set before Gulliver won the next three) so we just brushed off that first set on and brought it from there. I think that nobody expected us to be here and make it to this point. We lost all of those seniors off of last year’s team so we’ve been kind of playing with no real pressure on us to prove anything.”

When asked about his senior leader, Rodriguez gushed with praise.

“That’s the kind of character she has and showed at that moment,” said Rodriguez of Rose-Rivera’s move to call the team together. “That’s the type of player that she is. She took too long to get going in that first set, her motor wasn’t humming and we played that entire first set with her not playing up to her standards. She told her teammates she was going to make up for it for the next three and you saw what happened.”

Rose-Rivera didn’t do it alone. She had a lot of help, most notably from sophomore Kate Welty who recorded 14 kills, many of them at key moments when Pine Crest was trying to build momentum, and libero Mia Lavalle who had 28 digs, many of them remarkable saves that saw her hit the floor to keep points alive.

“I feel like the pressure was really on them (Pine Crest) tonight because I think everyone expected them to win since we beat them in our gym last year and now they were getting us in their gym,” Welty said. “I think after that first set, all the nerves were out of us and I think we just settled down, loosened up, and after we won that second set, you could feel us getting the momentum and see them tightening up a little.”

For Pine Crest, it was another frustrating end to a promising season. That Panthers were looking for the first state final four berth since 2017 and first state title since 2003 when they completed a three-peat.

“Credit to Gulliver, they played well and deserve to move on but we also were not at our best tonight,” Pine Crest coach Eric Rivera said. “We lost our confidence, from second set on, we struggled with our serve receive. Because of that, we fell behind early in every set and were always seemingly battling uphill from behind.”