Georgia Shines In Volleyball Rankings With Three Top 25 and Two All-Americans
With the season off and rolling, MaxPreps released their first rankings of the year and three Georgia teams landed in the top 25 while two players from Georgia landed on the pre-season All-American Team. St. Pius, Blessed Trinity and Walton were among the top 25 teams list. St. Pius came in ranked the highest among the three at No. 6. The Golden Lions are off to an 9-0 start with wins over four defending Georgia High School Association state champs, including 5A’s McIntosh, who the Golden Lions fell to in the semi-finals, 7A’s Alpharetta, 6A’s Buford and 3A’s Westminster. The Lions return five key players from last year’s team including All-American Emma Farrell.
Coming in at No. 15 is Blessed Trinity, who is off to a 18-2 start to the season which included a stretch of 11 straight wins. The Titans, the 2019 GHSA 4A state title winners, have notable wins over defending GHSA state champs Marist and Alpharetta. The Titans finished 2020 as the GHSA 5A runner ups after falling to McIntosh in the championship match but return six players from that team including Cate Wright, Mia Hood and setter Ashlynn Barnes. Rounding out the top 25 is the Walton Raiders coming in at No. 25. The Raiders are off to a 6-1 start with wins over 2020 state champs, Marist, Westminster and Alpharetta, who the Raiders lost to in the 2020 state title match.
MaxPreps also released their 2021 Preseason All-American teams in which McIntosh’s Alexa Markley made the first team of hitters and St. Pius’s Emma Farrell made second team libero/defensive specialist. Markley finished the 2020 season with 405 kills and helped the Chiefs win their fourth straight state title. Farrell end the 2020 season with a career total 1,454 digs and 176 aces on 1,314 serves.
