McKinney North finished the District 9-5A volleyball schedule the way it started it, with a win, and nothing but wins in between. The Bulldogs closed a 16-0 league run Friday night with a four-set victory at Lovejoy and head into next week's playoffs as outright district champions.
Across those 16 matches, North won 48 sets and dropped two, according to MaxPreps standings updated Saturday. The only matches that went past three sets were the league opener at Anna on Aug. 18 and Friday's finale at Lovejoy. The other 14 were sweeps, including both meetings with second-place Celina.
Celina finished second at 14-2, and both of its league losses came against North. Lovejoy was third at 11-5 and Melissa fourth at 10-6, with Anna one game back at 9-7.
A tougher early schedule
All six losses in North's 23-6 overall record came in August, when the Bulldogs played a tournament-heavy non-district slate. Five of them came in tournament play, against Westlake, Alamo Heights, Keller, Episcopal and Byron Nelson, and the sixth was a five-set road loss at Frisco Liberty in the season opener, per MaxPreps.
Since the Aug. 29 tournament wins over Eagle Mountain and Grapevine, North has not lost. MaxPreps lists the team on a 16-match winning streak entering the postseason.
MaxPreps has North's bi-district match set for Thursday, Oct. 29, at 6:30 p.m. against Texarkana Texas High. UIL's calendar sets Oct. 27 as the deadline for districts to certify playoff teams, with bi-district matches Oct. 29-31.
Boyd settles into second in 6-6A
In Class 6A, McKinney Boyd finished second in District 6-6A at 10-2, behind an Allen team that went 12-0. Boyd swept McKinney High 3-0 on Friday in its regular-season finale.
Boyd's two league losses both came against Allen: 3-1 on Sept. 25 and 3-0 on Tuesday. The set Boyd won in the first meeting is the only one Allen surrendered in league play, according to MaxPreps, which credits Allen with a 36-1 set record in the district. Boyd did beat Allen once this season, in a three-set tournament match on Aug. 15.
Outside those two nights, Boyd's district schedule was a run of wins over Rock Hill, Princeton, Walnut Grove, Prosper and McKinney, including sweeps in eight of the 10. The Broncos are 28-7 overall, a record built against a non-district list that included Southlake Carroll, Keller, Coppell and Hebron.
