REACHING FOR IT — Oak Glen’s Averi Martin attempts to send the ball past Harrison Central’s Olivia Tonkovich, Lauren Doane and Hannah Grady while the Golden Bears’ McKenzi Martin, Kendall Six and Keira Vick look on during Tuesday’s OVAC Class 4A tournament semifinal. - Andrew Grimm

NEW MANCHESTER — The first of two repeat bids this season for Oak Glen is alive and well.

The defending OVAC Class 4A conference champions and West Virginia Class AA state champions entered Tuesday’s conference semifinal as the top seed looking to get a shot at a repeat title.

They did just that, as the Golden Bears took care of business against No. 4 seed Harrison Central on their home court with a sweep, earning a return trip to Saturday’s conference final match.

“The OVAC tournament is a big deal for our team and our girls and we came into tonight fired up,” Oak Glen head coach Morgan Saddler said. “We wanted to get to play on Saturday. It means a lot to them, these girls put in the work every day for each other that’s what it’s all about.”

The Golden Bears, now 23-3, opened leads early in all three sets on the way to a 25-19, 25-18, 25-14 victory over the Huskies (12-9).

“We definitely got stronger as we went,” Saddler said. “We focused a lot on the team aspects of the game and I think that kept us motivated.”

For Harrison Central, it was the first time the Huskies had qualified for the tournament since 2017. They knew the Bears would be a big challenge to draw in their return to the field, and they indeed were.

“I told the girls coming in that it was going to be a tough game we would need to play our best,” first-year Huskies head coach Grace Godich said. “Oak Glen is very good. I thought we played very hard. I’m glad we got to compete with a team like Oak Glen. That’s going to be big for us going into the postseason.

“Being in the top-four and making OVACs again was one of our main goals for the season and I’m proud of the girls for accomplishing that.”

Early deficits against a team like Oak Glen just proved to be too much to fight back from, especially in the third set when the Bears scored eight of the first nine points.

“That makes it tough against a good team,” Godich said of the early deficits. “I told them lets try to be the first to five and work our way from there, but we got in some holes and it’s hard to dig out of it. We’ve been working on that all season, some days we’re good at and some days we struggle and this was one of those games.”

For Oak Glen, Averi Martin registered 13 kills and three blocks, Mikalyn Balch tallied 32 assists, Brooklyn Six recorded 11 kills, two digs and six aces, Tia Vick recorded five aces and two digs, Addison Smith had 14 digs, Reecelyn Craig tallied five kills, five digs and an ace and McKenzi Martin finished with six kills, 12 digs and two aces.

The Huskies got 10 kills, seven blocks and six digs from Lauren Doane, four kills, two blocks and two digs from Olivia Tonkovich, three aces, seven assists and six digs from Leah Grady and 13 digs from Mikayla Pelegreen.

The Golden Bears will meet Beaver Local in the Class 4A championship match at 9 a.m. inside the ECO Center. The second-seeded Beavers defeated No. 3 East Liverpool in four sets on Tuesday in the other semifinal. Oak Glen won a regular season meeting between the cross-river foes back on Sept. 3.