This Seahawks volleyball team just matched past great squads. But can it one-up them?

A year later, the Myrtle Beach volleyball team is back to finish the job it started.

The Seahawks (22-7-2) earned a return bid to the Class 4A state title game on Tuesday, taking down rival North Myrtle Beach 3-1 (25-19, 25-13, 18-25, 25-18). Awaiting them at Chapin High School on Saturday will be Upper State 4A champion Pickens, which defeated defending champion Aiken in four games.

“To go back to back, and have this group of girls that are here for the second time, hopefully it is the X-factor,” said Myrtle Beach volleyball coach Larry Church. “Being on that stage again, I think that was a huge factor for us tonight against North Myrtle Beach. I thought the girls played great tonight … they want it. They’re a little hungrier than last year, I think.”

Their hunger revealed itself particularly in the first two games, where Myrtle Beach hit the Chiefs with wave after wave. According to North Myrtle Beach head man Alex Sing, it was nothing his team wasn’t prepared for.

“We knew it was going to be a battle, we played them five times now,” he said. “We knew it was one of those games about momentum, and they seemed to carry momentum more than we did and that’s kind of how it went. They made plays when they needed to make them.”

A turning point came in the first game, and the Seahawks leading 15-13. Myrtle Beach would score the next six points, allowing it to eventually go up a set. It would carry that same momentum into the second stanza, scoring each of the first seven points.

Said Sing: “Our serve-receive kind of broke down a little bit and stuff, but yeah they have some good servers back there. Their seniors do a good job.”

Despite falling behind two games, the Chiefs would not go down without a fight.

North Myrtle Beach (29-10-1) never trailed in the third game, taking it 25-19 and pushing pressure back to the opposite end of the floor. The Seahawks would shrug it off, however, starting the fourth set with a 6-0 run to quickly put their foes from Little River back on their heels.

“Anytime you play a team that good, if they have to struggle and claw back into it, they’re using up a lot of energy,” Church said. “In the last set we stemmed the tide a little bit, we got out to a big lead and nursed it.

“We got a little conservative there at the end … it frustrates me as a coach because you want your team to go out there and finish teams. But North Myrtle Beach to their credit played hard.”

With the win, Myrtle Beach claimed its third Lower State volleyball title – the first in 2011, and the other coming a year ago. Neither trip was fruitful, though.

This time around, only a state championship will do.

“We’ve seen the best competition in the state, we’ve seen it all year,” Church said. “With North Myrtle, (St. Joseph’s), who’s probably in the 2A final, Bishop England we’ve played, Wando we’ve played, Dorman we’ve played. We’ve played six of the teams that are likely to be in Columbia on Saturday.

“That level of competition is one of those things that will help us out this year.”

First serve is at 4:30 p.m. on Saturday.

This story was originally published October 31, 2017 at 10:08 PM with the headline "This Seahawks volleyball team just matched past great squads. But can it one-up them?."