Contact: Jenni Brockman Three points after Liz Bruno’s fifth kill Friday night (10/29), St. Margaret’s volleyball team sealed an easy 15-3, 15-1,15-9 victory over Trinity Episcopal. One year ago, SMS won the League of Independent Schools regular season and tournament championships. This year, without 1998 Virginia State Volleyball Player of the Year Cynthia Walker who now plays for The University of Florida Lady Gators in Gainesville, everyone assumed 1999 would be a rebuilding year. Then the Bruno sisters arrived. Liz Bruno and her younger sister Adrienne, who live in New Orleans, LA, are turning heads this fall. Their attention, mostly, is due to how viciously each girl whacks a volleyball; the Brunos combine their strengths to fashion a nerve-racking imposing presence for their opponents. "We love to set Liz and Adrienne up for kills," says setter Kym Register, a senior from Carborro, NC. "They smack the living daylights out of the ball—we just can’t get enough." That, apparently, wasn’t the case, for a young Trinity team force fed one Bruno kill after another Friday night. With each aggressive hit, the stakes grew painstakingly high for Trinity who could not derail either Bruno sister nor any part of the SMS offensive train. After building a 7-1 Game 1 lead on a thundering shot by senior Cameron Sgroi, of Tappahannock, Kym Register set Liz Bruno for a kill that put SMS in front 8-2. Following a Trinity point, Adrienne Bruno slapped a winner over the net; senior Melissa Mancusso effortlessly served the final six points en route to a 15-3 Game 1 dismissal of Trinity. Strong serving by junior Cathy Ryan, of Tappahannock, and senior Sara Pirtle, of Champlain, helped lift SMS to victory in Game 2. Winning 15-1, St. Margaret’s head coach Bill Walker, of Warsaw, felt at ease to adjust his lineup for Game 3. Beginning Game 3 just as she did Game 1, Liz Bruno delivered a spike to the center of the court hoping Trinity would muster a fledgling return for SMS to block back—they didn’t. Kym Register followed with 5 consecutive service points as teammates Mancusso and Pirtle began to snack on post-game oranges from the SMS bench. Liz Bruno came up with a key block early on that put the Scotties ahead 5-0. Trinity rallied but to no avail; SMS knocked off Trinity for the third consecutive game that afternoon. "They are awesome to watch play," said Walker of the Bruno sisters. "We have a tendency to slack up and when we do they [Liz and Adrienne] always help bring us back in the game. They really know how to step it up and get everybody back together playing as a team." The 1999 L.I.S. Volleyball Tournament quarterfinals and semifinals began Tuesday; the tournament championship will be played Friday, November 5.
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St. Margaret’s Volleyball Spikes Trinity
1999 SMS Volleyball Team - (back row, left) Cameron Sgroi, Coach Bill Walker, Melissa Mancusso, Liz Bruno, Adrienne Bruno, Shannon Davis, Lisa Bruning, Rachelle Slotnick, Lindsay Neist; (front row, left) Kym Register, Sara Pirtle, Cathy Ryan, Bo Hammond, and Alexes Anderson, Manager.
Senior Liz Bruno, of New Orleans, LA, stands at the net with Lindsay Neist (right) Friday, while teammate Sara Pirtle (background) snacks on oranges.
