Piechota leads hopeful Batavia squad

Updated: March 22, 2011 5:14PM

Caitlin Piechota and her Batavia volleyball teammates this week hope to do something only one other Bulldog team has done in the 36-year history of the program - win a regional title.

"We won it in 2005," said Batavia coach Lori Trippi-Payne, who has had 17 winning seasons in her 24 years leading the program. "We were a 4 seed that year. This year, we're a 3 seed. We rarely ever get a 1 through 4 seed.

"We're usually good, but not great, so in a big sectional it seems like we're always getting an 8 or 9. The problem with that is, you win that first match and you're playing a 1 or 2 seed. I can't tell you how many times that has happened to us."

This is the 11th Trippi-Payne team that has topped the 20-win mark but the first to reach 30. And these scrappy, defensive-minded Bulldogs (30-5) head the field at the Class 4A Regional that opens play Thursday.

Saturday's 1 p.m. final could pit the 30-5 Bulldogs against host Geneva (22-13), if the seeds hold up.

Batavia prevailed in a three-game regular-season match between the area rivals on the way to claiming the inaugural Upstate Eight Conference River championship.

Winning that title was a "really, really big deal, especially with us being the new people in the conference," said Piechota, a 5-foot-9 left-handed outside hitter who helps lead the Bulldogs with her strong all-around game.

"She stepped up her game this year," Trippi-Payne said of the NCAA Division I Western Carolina University recruit who plays club ball for Sports Performance. "She was a good defensive player last year but she's become one of our best defensive players and, offensively, she's done a great job."

Piechota ranks at or near the top of the charts for the Bulldogs in most statistical categories. She leads the team with 265 kills, 49 aces and 224 service points and is second on the team with 217 digs, 94 percent serve-receive and .424 kill percentage.

Coaches from Western Carolina, a member of the Southland Conference located in Cullowhee, N.C., saw her playing in an AAU tournament last spring in Orlando, Fla., and invited her to their team camp in June. They liked what they saw and extended a scholarship offer.

Piechota liked what she saw, too, when she arrived on the campus 52 miles from Asheville between the Great Smoky and Blue Ridge Mountains. She turned down offers from Western Illinois and Grand Valley State.

"I fell in love with it right away. It's beautiful. Like you took a mountain and dug out a hole and put the campus down in it," said Piechota, who wants to teach grade school children and was drawn to the school's national award winning teacher education program.

But there's postseason business to attend to first, before she takes the next step.

"She went out and improved her blocking over the offseason, too," Trippi-Payne said. "She's become a much better blocker (17 block kills)."

It was much needed, because the Bulldogs don't overwhelm opponents with intimidating size. They don't have a six-footer, with junior right side/setter Mary Nilles and sophomore middle hitter Kristen Koncelik listed as the tallest players on the team at 5-11½.

They don't, however, let many balls hit the floor.

"We work a lot on defense," Trippi-Payne said. "I work on defense in the preseason days and days before we start working on offense."

If it pays off with a regional title, the Bulldogs will likely face a like-minded team in York in the first round of the Bartlett Sectional.

"I think they have one middle who is 6-foot," Trippi-Payne said. "Size-wise, we're almost the same exact size player for player. They play great defense and pick up everything off the floor and pass really well.

"Two very similar teams. There would be a lot of long rallies. That would be a crazy matchup."

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