Orem • Abbey Blevins couldn’t catch her breath.
The Panguitch middle blocker suddenly felt like she couldn’t breathe midway through Saturday’s Class 1A volleyball state championship match. Officials stopped the match as the junior tried to collect herself on the court.
“I don’t know what happened,” Blevins said. “It just felt like I was going through a dream really. I could see everything happening, but I couldn’t process it in my mind.”
When she was asked if she needed to come out of the game, however, Blevins knew she wanted to stay.
And by the end of the evening, Blevins and her Panguitch teammates were living a different kind of dream entirely.
The Bobcats took home the state title, beating the Rich Rebels in four sets.
“It’s crazy,” junior libero Brittney Henrie said. “We all knew from the beginning that this is what we were working for. I don’t know how to explain it. It’s just a really good feeling.”
The Bobcats had gone through their season with the taste of last year’s championship defeat to the Rebels in their mouths, and they figured they would be heading for a rematch.
“We definitely wanted revenge,” Henrie said. “We’ve been preparing for Rich for a long time.”
Panguitch won the first two sets, 25-21 and 25-23. Then the Rebels started to find their stride, taking the third set 25-18. In the fourth set, Rich led 16-12 and looked to have momentum on its side.
“It was really scary. They started finding their rhythm,” said Panguitch coach Troy Norris, who won his fourth state title. “We couldn’t stop them. We tried everything.”
PANGUITCH 3, RICH 1 <br>• Panguitch gets revenge after last year’s loss to Rich in the Class 1A state championship. <br>• Bobcats junior Abbey Blevins leads Panguitch’s attack in the middle and spikes home the decisive match point. <br>• Panguitch coach Troy Norris claims his fourth state title, but his first since returning from a five-year hiatus as the school’s volleyball coach.
Eventually, however, the Bobcats would get back on track, reeling off 10 straight points to take control.
“They’re a good team. They’re better than us,” said Rich coach Cindy Stuart, the winningest volleyball coach in Utah high school history.
Stuart added, “[Blevins] hurt us the most. She hurt us the most.”
Blevins provided the punctuation point, a thunderous hit into a soft spot in the Rich defense to give Panguitch the 25-19 win in the fourth set, and its third title in four years.
“It’s always been my dream to get that final hit,” she said as she fought back tears. “This is all the blood sweat and tears I’ve ever put into this sport. This is the payoff.”