SALINA – When Saida Jacobs helped Mill Valley capture its first-ever state volleyball championship last fall, the Jaguar standout admitted she had a hard time imagining any better feeling in the world.
 
She was wrong.
 
“This tops it,” Jacobs said after leading the Jaguars to a second consecutive Class 6A state title Saturday at Salina’s Tony’s Pizza Events Center. “No doubt about it.”
 
Not only was Jacobs a leading figure in Mill Valley’s three-set 25-12, 20-25, 25-10 win over Blue Valley West in the championship match, she got the ultimate high in delivering the title-clinching point. On a point that encapsulated Mill Valley’s ability to keep a volley alive long enough to let one of its playmakers to make a play, Jacobs provided the clinching kill on a perfectly placed dink over the block of two West defenders that fell to the floor, setting off Mill Valley’s second straight championship celebration.
 
Now that’s a moment that may never be topped.
 
“It’s crazy, honestly I just blacked out for a second,” Jacobs said. “As soon as it happened and I realized we just won, I started bawling. At that moment, it felt so unreal. I was instantly shaking and it was just so surreal.”
 

 
The second straight championship capped a 37-5 season for Mill Valley, which cruised past Manhattan 25-13, 25-12 in the semifinals. Blue Valley West, seeking its first state title since 2020, finished with a 37-5 record as well, rallying past Olathe West 13-25, 25-20, 25-22 in its semifinal match.
 
Those semifinal wins set up a rematch of different championship match between the Jaguar rivals, this one coming in the finals of the Oct. 12 De Soto Tournament. In that match, Blue Valley West jumped all over Mill Valley for a 25-15 win in the first set and then fought off a challenge in the second set for a 25-23 straight-set victory.
 
As tough of a loss as it was, Mill Valley coach Kylie Corneliusen said it also proved beneficial in Saturday’s rematch.
 
“We struggled in that game and after that we made a few lineup changes to our benefit,” she said. “We were going back and forth with two middles for the other middle and we stuck with one. And then we had a freshman kid come in and play right back. Just some things that elevated our game.”
 
The middle Corneliusen settled on to play opposite of Jacobs was Leilah Perry, a six-foot junior who’d seen action in only 45 of Mill Valley’s 86 sets in the regular season. But given the role in the state championship match, she came up big.
 
Perry had the game-clinching block in the first set of the championship match, moments after delivering a big kill as well. She then opened the second and third sets with kills and sprinkled in a handful of other blocks and kills at big moments with her final kill of the night preceding Jacobs’ match clinching kill.
 
“I’m so proud of her,” Corneliusen said. “She’s a kid that came to us as a freshman and was on the freshman team and hadn’t played a lot of volleyball. She’s just worked her tail off and it doesn’t happen that often that a kid goes from the freshman team to a starting middle.”
 
It’s also not often that a freshman comes into a program and has the immediate impact that Riley Riggs had a year ago when she stepped into a starring role in the Jaguars’ attack, finishing second on the team in kills to Kaitlyn Burke. With Burke having graduated last spring, Riggs became the motor that typically drove Mill Valley’s success – a role she embraces whole-heartedly.
 
“I love to set the tone,” Riggs said. “As soon as I get those first few kills, it gets me fired up and I think the team feeds off my energy. It really just helps us win.”
 

 
Riggs opened the championship match with back-to-back kills to jump start Mill Valley’s dominant 25-12 first set, hammering out three more in a decisive 10-1 run that turned a 10-7 lead into a 20-8 advantage.
 
Slowed a little with just three kills in the second set, she came back strong in the third set with five kills and an ace to power the Jaguars’ dominant finish.
 
“Riley had one heck of a tournament and she lives to be in these moments,” Corneliusen said. “You don’t teach that, she just has it. Everyone fuels off that and when they see her going, she just holds everyone to a higher standard.”
 
After getting blown out in the first set, Blue Valley West showed its resiliency in the second set. Riding the power of its own sophomore sensation, six-footer Peyton Kubik, West got out to a 10-5 lead and after Mill Valley closed to 14-13, responded with a 6-1 run to open up a 20-15 edge it pretty much maintained the rest of the set in taking a 25-20 win.
 
But that set was the only one where West’s offense really clicked on all cylinders and when Mill Valley got West out of rhythm again early in the third set, West couldn’t recover.
 
“It seemed like all day it was like that,” West coach Jessica Horstick said of playing from behind. “Even in the semifinals. It’s exhausting to do that and it eventually catches up with you. That day (West beat Mill Valley), we played lights out. We didn’t make many errors and that was not us today. They served so tough, kudos to them. They served us off the court and we couldn’t get a good first touch which put us on the defensive all the time. We did that to them the last time.
 
“They had a lot of weapons they could go to and did a nice job of taking us out of what we wanted to do.”
 
“We talked every single day about whoever wins the serve-pass game wins the game,” Corneliusen said. “We got them out of system and we were in system and that was the difference. I told them all year, ‘When we’re in system, with our amazing setter – one of the best in the nation in my mind – nobody’s going to beat you.’ That’s what we did.”
 
If West ran out of steam, it was somewhat understandable. While Mill Valley was cruising to the finals with its semifinal sweep of Manhattan, West was locked in a battle with Olathe West – a team that had beaten the Jaguars twice during the regular season, handing them half of their regular-season losses.
 
Olathe West came out on fire, blowing out the Jaguars 25-13 in the first set. But Blue Valley West regrouped and won the second set 25-20. The momentum flipped back to the Owls in the third set as they got out to a 17-9 lead and seemed poised to turn the program’s first state appearance into one where they played for the title.
 
But the Jagaurs got two big blocks from freshman Jensen Kubik to turn the tide and went on a 7-2 run to get back in it. After Olathe West took a 22-20 lead, the Jaguars finished the match on a 5-0 run with Peyton Kubik getting a pair of kills in that stretch and Brookelyn Hatton delivering a key ace.
 
“Any time you have an emotional game like that, it takes so much out of you,” Horstick said. “It happened to us four years ago when we beat Washburn Rural and had that emotional win and then we kind of let down in the final. Maybe that’s something we need to work on. You have to be able to ride the roller coaster and end up here (on a high) instead of here (on a low).”
 

 
Mill Valley was trending up prior to Corneliusen’s arrival as head coach three years ago, going 31-8 in Jacobs’ freshman year, but missing out on state. In the past three years, the Jaguars have taken fourth and now back-to-back titles.
 
“My freshman year, we didn’t make to state but when Coach Corneliusen came in she just brought us to the next level,” Jacobs said. “She stepped up our game and to be able to call her my coach, I’m so grateful. She’s the best coach ever.
 
“It means a lot but we can’t rest on this. We have to come back and win it again, have that grind to do it again. You can’t say, ‘We won last year, we’re going to win this year.’ It’s not like that. You have to have that mindset to come out and play harder than you did last year.”
 
Blue Valley West will graduate six seniors, but return the Kubik sisters. Mill Valley, meanwhile, will lose five seniors, but return standout setter Ella Florez as well as Riggs, Perry and freshman hitter Sophia Sturdy, who also came up with some big kills in the title match.
 
And now that she’s two-for-two with titles in her high school career, Riggs is ready to make another run.
 
“We just connect so well and with all the talent we have on this team, everyone can just play,” Riggs said. “Once we figured out how to play together, everything fell in place and we’ve just kept it going. A lot of teams put a target on us because we won a championship last year, but in the end it didn’t matter because we won again.
 
“More to come.”
 
Olathe West finished its first state tournament with a third-place finish, beating Manhattan 25-12, 25-22 in the third-place match to cap a 34-6 season. Manhattan finished 21-19.
 

 
CLASS 6A 
 
At Tony’s Pizza Events Center, Salina
 
SEMIFINALS
 
Blue Valley West def. Olathe West, 13-25, 25-20, 25-22
 
Mill Valley def. Manhattan, 25-14, 25-12
 
CHAMPIONSHIP
 
Mill Valley def. Blue Valley West, 25-12, 20-25, 25-10
 
THIRD PLACE
 
Olathe West def. Manhattan, 25-12, 25-22