Howard senior setter Julia McKenna – playing her first game without a knee brace since tearing her ACL in last year's 4A North regional championship game loss to Dulaney – didn't show any reservations in the Lions' four-set win over visiting Broadneck on Tuesday.
"She's medically cleared to roam free, and she showed it tonight," said Howard coach Grant Scott. "She's absolutely the key for us. She knows how to run my offense. She knows when the hitters are on an off, she knows how to distribute the ball, and she's smart with the ball. She really is the engine that drives our offense. Without her I don't know if we get all those kills."
The Lions, who won 25-13, 25-16, 23-25, 25-13, had several hitters reach double-digit kills. Senior outside hitter Sarah Sweet led the way with 15, junior middle blocker Christina Kundrat and junior outside hitter Anna Jezerski had 11 each, and senior middle blocker Sara Binkley added 10.
In the middle of it all, though, was McKenna, distributing balls left, right, backward and forward to her crew of hitters to finish with 40 assists.
Madison Paige, a junior who transferred to Howard after two years at Long Reach and finished with three kills, a pair of blocks and aces and nine digs, said, "without Julia, there would be no offense. And she's definitely one of the hardest working players I've played with in my life, so having her on the team and having her coming back from the ACL injury and knowing if she can do this then I can do this, it's definitely a huge support system for our team."
Howard won the first two sets easily and wasn't truly tested by Broadneck until the third set. The Bruins took their first lead of any set at 6-5 in the third, but the Lions battled back and eventually took back the lead at 21-20. However, Howard committed three errors in the final stretch, and Melbourne Bottorff pounded a kill to win the set, 25-23.
"They picked up their game in the third set and really started to pass – they were making a lot of mistakes early and they made it competitive," Scott said. "But I was proud of the way we played. We didn't let it get us down and we came back strong in the fourth set."
The Lions got off to another slow start in the fourth set, but with a 10-8 lead they pulled away by getting six kills – including four straight – in a span of eight points to take 17-9 advantage. Sweet and Kundrat each had two in the run, and Howard cruised to a comfortable 25-13 fourth-set victory to improve to 2-0 on the season.