• For the second straight year the Final Four featured four Bay State Conference teams.
No. 1 Needham boys volleyball advanced to its sixth straight state championship with a 3-0 win (25-20, 25-18, 25-16) over No. 12 Newton North on June 9.
The Tigers had an uncharacteristically rough regular season, finishing 6-11, but went on a postseason run, upsetting No. 5 Lexington and No. 4 Chelmsford to get to the semifinals. But the Rockets handled them with ease, sweeping the Tigers for the third time this season.
The teams went back and forth early in the first, before Needham took a 10-7 lead. Newton North scored four straight points to pull back within one, but the Rockets went on a 5-2 run to make it 17-13. Needham continued to roll from there, taking the first set 25-20.
Newton North took its largest lead of the match in the second set at 7-4, and Needham answered with a seven-point run to go up 11-9. The Rockets never gave the lead back to the Tigers and won the set 25-18 to take a 2-0 lead in the match.
The third set was all Needham, as they jumped out to a 4-0 lead, prompting a Newton North timeout. The Rockets built their largest lead of the game at 17-7 and eventually won 25-16 to finish the sweep and advance to the state title game.
Senior Will Rozman led Needham with 14 kills, while Matty Cloonan added six. Thomas Klein and Frederick Goodman each collected five kills.
No. 2 Brookline defeated No.3 Natick on the other side of the bracket, setting up a rematch of last year’s state title game between the Warriors and the Rockets. Brookline defeated Needham 3-1 in that game, earning its first state championship since 1992.
The two Bay State Conference teams split their regular season meetings this year. The Warriors won in five sets on April 30, while the Rockets swept them on May 14. The teams will play for the title on Friday, June 12, at 6 p.m. at Newton South High School.
Mike Levin has highlights from the semifinal win for Needham from this week’s Needham Channel News here:
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