After Sterling rallied to win the first set, Morris returned the favor in the third set Thursday in the Class 3A Sterling Regional final.

Trailing 22-20 and facing the end of its season, Morris scored the final five points of the match to pull out a 21-25, 25-9, 25-22 victory over the Golden Warriors at Musgrove Fieldhouse.

It’s Morris’ first regional title since 2015, and saw 11 seniors earn a bit of redemption after falling in the Dixon Regional title match last year to the host Duchesses.

“I can’t stop crying, I’m so happy,” Morris senior Tessa Shannon said. “It was all trust, just playing with energy and trusting our teammates, for sure.”

Top-seeded Morris (30-6) trailed 18-15 in the first set before seizing a 21-19 lead. But fourth-seeded Sterling (19-16) fought back, as a Kasey Weeks kill sparked a closing 6-0 run; she also had a block and Nia Harris slammed a kill in that surge.

Morris came out on fire in the second set, building an 18-6 lead on the back of solid passing and a balanced offense. Shannon, Hannah Linn, Lily Hansen and Rosemary Misener all had multiple kills, and Misener and Hansen stuffed blocks to keep the momentum going.

“We knew that we had to focus up and just bring more energy. We knew what their strategy was and what they were going to do, so we were ready for it,” Morris libero Alyssa Jepson said. “We really just said we were going to fight for every single point, put it all out there.”

“That’s been the story of this group, they never give up,” Morris coach Scott Howell said. “You go through that first set and you could really put your head down and take yourself out of that, but we came out of it angry, fought back, and played even harder in those tight spots.”

On the other side, the Golden Warriors were looking to flush away that second set and regain the form from the opener.

“We just forgot about it and kept playing hard,” Weeks said. “I think we focused a lot on energy, and we play better when we have energy. The momentum felt great, and even though it slowed down in the second set, I thought we brought it back in the third set.”

“The second set, we just said, ‘Forget that, it didn’t happen, let’s come back and get the third set,’” libero Grace Springman added. “We were all thinking that second set didn’t matter, and we wanted to come back and win the third set for our seniors – and the rest of the team, too, because we wanted to keep playing [this season].”

That final set was nip-and-tuck the whole way. Morris took a 7-4 lead on a Misener block, but Sterling fought back with three kills and a block from Harris and took an 11-8 lead on a Harris ace.

Two Alasia Harris Rascon kills gave the Warriors their biggest lead at 14-9, but Morris rebounded with blocks from Hansen and Misener and kills from Misener and Linn to tie it at 15. A Harris kill put Sterling back in front 18-15, but kills by Linn, Olivia Peterson and Misener cut Morris’ deficit to 19-18.

Kills by Kaelee Varden and Harris put Sterling up 21-19, then the teams traded errors to get to 22-20. After a timeout, Hansen stuffed a block, then Linn ripped a kill to tie it at 22 and force a Sterling timeout. Undeterred, Shannon served an ace, setter Alexis Williams dumped a kill on the second touch, and Linn tooled the block for the final kill to finish off the win.

“Honestly, our offense is stacked all the way around. I always know our offense is going to get it done,” Shannon said. “It’s 10 times easier when our passing is on, because we can get a better set and then put it down. It really gets us going when the back row is playing well.”

“Our passers feed off of our hitters, and our hitters feed off of our passers, so when everyone all comes together as a team, we flow and just keep pushing,” Jepson added. “It feels amazing, really exciting to win a regional title.”

Linn led Morris with 15 kills, Misener added six kills and five blocks, Peterson smacked four kills, and Hansen had three kills and four blocks. Alexis Williams dished 20 assists, Jepson led the back row with 16 digs to go with nine points, two aces and five assists, Cami Pfeifer added 11 points and four digs, and Shannon chipped in 11 digs, 11 points and two kills.

Harris led the Warriors with 13 kills and 11 digs to go with a pair of blocks, and Harris Rascon had nine kills, seven points and five digs. Weeks finished with four kills and three blocks, Springman had nine digs, and Brylee Brady added five digs and four points. Sydney Griffin set 18 assists, and Madison Birdsley dished 10 more.