West Allegheny High School girls' volleyball coach Lisa Pyrdek was concerned that her team might not get to play at home in the first round of the WPIAL playoffs, despite being seeded No. 1 in the 22-team Class AA bracket.

The tournament began Tuesday with six preliminary round matches. The winners of those six matches are paired against the top six seeds and the WPIAL prefers not to have teams playing two nights in a row.

"The football team was scheduled to play at home [last night] against Montour, so it would be tough to host two sporting events at the same time," said Pyrdek, before Monday's WPIAL pairings meeting. "That means we will probably be on the road in the first round."

Fortunately for the Indians, the WPIAL went against its normal procedure and scheduled West Allegheny's first-round match for Wednesday night. The Indians proceeded to blank Beaver, 3-0, after the Bobcats had done the same to Washington in Tuesday's preliminary round.

West Allegheny will play Derry Area in a quarterfinal match Tuesday at a site and time to be determined.

It's no surprise that West Allegheny is the No. 1 seed, as the Indians have advanced to the WPIAL Class AA title match three of the past four years. The Indians claimed their first WPIAL title with last year's 3-1 victory against defending champion Hopewell.

"The experience we gained at both the WPIAL and PIAA tournaments last year will certainly help," Pyrdek said. "The pressure that comes in that type of match is something you can't experience during the regular season."

But Pyrdek also realizes that being the defending champion and top seed does not assure a return trip to the WPIAL title match.

"There's definitely more pressure in being a defending champion," Pyrdek said. "We've had a bull's-eye on our backs all season. It's never an easy match for us because everybody wants to knock off the defending champion."

West Allegheny entered the playoffs with a 10-1 record, which included a 9-1 mark in Section 3-AA. The Indians shared the section title with No. 4 seed South Fayette.

"We split [our matches] with South Fayette and both teams won on the road," Pyrdek said. "They beat us in five games in the first half [of section play] and we swept them in the second half [in last week's section finale].

"The difference is that we were not as mentally tough as we could have been in the first match [against South Fayette]. We made a lot of mental mistakes. We played mentally tough in the second match. The girls were really fired up. They knew how much that match meant."

West Allegheny may face South Fayette a third time, considering the Lions are seeded fourth. The two could meet in the semifinals. Freeport earned the No. 2 seed and Indiana is No. 3.

West Allegheny earned its top seed with impressive performances at four regular-season tournaments. The Indians won titles at the Butler and South Fayette tournaments, placed second at the MAC tournament and tied for third at Moon.

Pyrdek uses a 10-player rotation, which includes three players who were voted WPIAL Class AA All-Stars, 5-foot-10 senior middle hitter Korin Wengryn, 6-0 senior outside hitter Chelsea Katkich and 6-0 junior setter Carissa Miara.

Wengryn and Katkich are two of six seniors. The other four seniors are 5-8 libero Alexa Seybold, 5-8 middle hitter Haley Hanczar, 5-5 defensive specialist Jaimie Borchart and 5-5 defensive specialist/back-up setter Angela Devereaux.

The three newcomers to West Allegheny's starting rotation are 5-7 junior defensive specialist Katelinn Long, 5-7 sophomore outside hitter Jaclyn Placha and 5-8 sophomore right/outside hitter Morgan Seybold.

"Morgan is Alexa's younger sister," Pyrdek said. "Morgan did not letter last year, but did see some playing time in the WPIAL playoffs due to an injury."

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