By:  J. Daniel Pearson

Osceola’s volleyball team is one game away from playing for their first ever state championship.

The Lady Kowboys earned that right on Wednesday night, recording a 25-22, 25-15, 25-23 straight-set win over Vero Beach to capture the 7A, Region 2 championship.  

With the victory, Osceola now advances to the State Final Four, along with Plant, Winter Park and Boca Raton.  Those four teams will be reseeded this week and the Kowboys will play in a state semifinal game at Polk State College (Winter Haven) a week from Friday (Nov. 8) at either 4 or 7 p.m.  A victory there would put them in the 7A State Championship game at 7 p.m. Saturday.

But for the next day or two, the Kowboys (24-4) will enjoy their second region championship in the last two years – getting past Vero Beach (19-5) without dropping a set.  “Its something you always hope for but I wasn’t certainly wasn’t anticipating it,” Osceola coach Carrie Palmi said of the sweep.  “They are a big, athletic team and I was ready for a four or five set fight.  We got the momentum early, held it through two sets and kept our focus when we needed it in the third.”

Although Osceola would build a five point lead in the first set, Vero would battle back to make it 23-22 with a late rally.    But after the teams traded service errors, Cate Palmi’s thunderous spike put Game 1 on Osceola’s side of the ledger.  

Lady Kowboys
Lady Kowboys
Lady Kowboys

The Lady Kowboys grabbed an early 5-2 lead in set two, but a Vero Beach rally cut the lead to 10-9. Still it would be as close as they would get in the set as Osceola went on a huge 11-2 run to take control.  Sophie Spivey had four kills and an ace to spur the run.

Playing with division one commits Cate Palmi and Jordin Southall, Spivey seldom gets the attention those two generate but Coach Palmi was quick to acknowledge her contributions.  “She (Spivey) has been a valuable part of this team all season and she was again tonight,” she said.  “We felt going in we had a mismatch with Sophie that we could exploit and that’s what happened in the second set.  Looking back, I probably should have played her more in first set.”

Osceola would build leads of 6-1 and 13-6 in the final set, but Vero fought back behind the play of sophomore middle hitter Ella Gravlee.  Two kills by the 6-3, Gravlee and a couple of attack errors by Osceola cut the gap to 15-12.  The comeback continued when a Yahya Johnson spike capped a 9-6 Indian run to tie the score at 21-21.  But with the set on the line, a Vero serve went long and on the next play, Dari Bravo made an incredible dig off a hard Gravlee spike and Palmi followed with a kill to give Osceola a 23-21 lead.  Two points later, Palmi would then close out the match with her 18th kill of the night.

“Volleyball is a game of momentum and we had it for most of the night,” Coach Palmi said.  “Vero deserves a lot of credit for fighting back in the third set, and although they tied the score several times, we were able to kill their momentum each time and never let them take the lead.  Our fans deserve a lot of credit for this win; we had a big crowd and out players were feeding off the energy they provided all night.”

Plant (22-1) has been the top ranked team in the state all year in both 7A and across all classifications; while Winter Park (26-1) has been second, although they handed Plant their only loss of the season.  “It will be interesting to see if they flip them in the Final Four seeding,” Palmi said.  “But it’s pretty certain we will draw one of those two in the semifinals.  They are both outstanding teams and will present a tremendous challenge to us.”

It is the second time Osceola has reached the Final Four under Palmi and just the second time in school history.  Osceola lost to Hagerty in five sets in 2022.  The Kowboys go into the Final Four on a roll, having won nine straight matches without dropping a set since losing to Winter Park on Sept. 25.