SETTING — Weir High’s Amalia Kirlangitis sets in front of teammate Gabby Sprouse during Tuesday’s regional tournament match at Wheeling Central. - Kristin Mazgaj

The Knights, seeded No. 3 in W.Va.’s Class AA, Region 1, advance to face No. 2 Ravenswood, who defeated No. 7 Doddridge County in straight sets Tuesday, in the next round. Central will travel to Ravenswood on Thursday.

“We played a really good match Saturday up at Oak Glen versus Charleston Catholic, and so we’re trying to keep that momentum going into regionals,” Wheeling Central head coach Grace White said. “For us to get to host this first regional game, be comfortable, and get to kind of work on things in our own gym in a good atmosphere, hopefully we can hit the ground running quickly on Thursday.”

Wheeling Central is seeking to be the first Maroon Knights team to advance to the state tournament. Two teams from the Region will advance to states.

White, in her first year at the helm of the Maroon, is looking forward to whatever’s next.

READY — Weir High libero Kaylee Webster puts the ball up against Wheeling Central. - Kristin Mazgaj

“They’re a lot of fun,” White said of her team. “They’ve worked really hard. I mean, we maxed out our flex days in June. They want to head down state more than anything right now. And so that’s the driving factor.”

Against the Red Riders on Tuesday, Remy Peters and Morgan Miehle each had eight kills, while Lainey Peters had seven kills and four service aces.

Olivia Stephens led Wheeling Central with eight digs. Helene Crall paced the team with three blocks.

Weir was hurt Tuesday by the absence of sophomore outside hitter Ella Kaufman, but still played hard and earned the praise of their head coach Francesca Capaldi.

“Today we did face some adversity,” Capaldi said. “We had a last-minute injury after practice that kind of just threw our lineup off. We had several different lineups playing. We had several different girls filling in and changing positions today.

“I think what I’m proud most about is that we just kept going. We could have easily given up and quit and just folded the third step. But each set got better. Each set we scored more points. We became more confident in ourselves because, unfortunately, one of our players who got hurt was one of our better players.”

Amalia Kirlangitis tallied 13 assists for Weir. Illionna Kirlangitis led the team in digs with eight and kills with four.

The W.Va. Volleyball state tournament will take place inside the Charleston Coliseum and Convention Center from Nov. 11-13.