Walnut Hills has developed a top boys volleyball team. Taylor aims to follow its lead

The Walnut Hills Eagles visited the Taylor Yellow Jackets on Thursday, May 2, in a final tuneup before the postseason for both teams. Walnut Hills swept the hosts 25-15, 25-21, 25-21 to finish the regular season at 18-3 while Taylor fell to 12-10. It was also a meeting of a program that is surpassing the "up-and-coming" label and one trying to take it.

While teams like St. Xavier celebrate 30 years of boys volleyball and Moeller has over a decade's worth of state championship seasons, teams like Walnut Hills and Taylor are forced to catch up.

Since the program's start in 2017, Walnut Hills has shown rapid, year-by-year improvement with recent wins over top teams like St. Xavier and Elder and reaching the regional finals in 2021. After the conclusion of last season, the Eagles had to reload after graduating stars Griffin Wheatley and Evan Tombragel who combined for over 550 kills in 2023.

Walnut Hills passes the turnover test

Walnut Hills also hired Haley Henry as head coach, making her the third head coach in four years for the team. With 18 wins in the regular season and the No. 4 seed in the region wrapped up, the Eagles passed the test of dealing with the churn of a varsity roster in a new season.

"Getting the guys to know that this is not the same team as last year," Henry said about dealing with big leadership expectations from such a young team. "Almost all of my starters are sophomores and I only have two seniors and four juniors on varsity.

"Giving them those expectations immediately and letting them build that confidence helped a lot."

Junior Jacob Gillotti was a sophomore last year when he had 46 kills, which was the most by a returning player. This year, Gillotti had 122 kills in the team's first 15 games, second most behind sophomore Emmett Corby's 169 kills. Junior setter Ben Smith has amassed over 500 assists in 2024 after nearing 300 last season while playing behind Miles DiNardo.

"Having that class of seniors last year to play against definitely helped these guys prepare for the season," Henry said. "Letting these guys know, 'Hey, you don't need to compare yourselves to anybody. You're just as good.' Giving them the confidence has been the biggest thing this season."

In just fifth season, Taylor sees a big future on the way

Across the other side of the net, Taylor and head coach Nick Boeing are looking to achieve the Walnut Hills-like growth.

Taylor won four games in its inaugural season in 2019, five games in 2021 and seven games in 2022 before the big jump to 16-7 in 2023, falling in the postseason to the eventual regional champions.

Entering the tournament in 2024, Taylor sits at 12-10. While the Yellow Jackets have fewer wins than the season before, the coaches and players see it as part of the process.

"Because of last year, this year I scheduled tougher," Boeing said. "We play a lot of high-end Division II teams, Lakota East, (Walnut Hills), Badin."

Senior Luke Weis, who began playing volleyball as a freshman in 2021, is Taylor's first four-year varsity player. Weis has accumulated over 200 kills as a senior after having over 300 last season while earning all-region honors.

"My freshman year we had one solid player, Will Strasser, who plays at Thomas More now," Weis said. "He was the only player we had; it was everybody else's first time playing. You could tell it was a new team. We struggled with the easy fundamentals.

"But every year, guys like (Jaxson Snell) started my sophomore year and Sam (Henline) came. Every year I've seen guys progress. Every single practice, every single game we progress."

Snell, a junior who didn't start setting until his freshman year, has accumulated over 1,500 assists in his career and was honorable mention in the region last season. He's joined by Henline in the junior class with his 169 kills, good for second on the team.

In the small history of Taylor boys volleyball, those players shaped the early culture and know they continue to pave the way for a newer generation.

"Our win ethic and our work ethic is always the same," Weis said. "If we had a big, upsetting loss or a big win, we went back the next practice and just focused. That's what took us from five wins to 16 wins."

Growing youth program has Taylor 'on the right track'

Coach Boeing and Taylor started a youth program to bolster the sport in the future with the first large group of those kids trickling into high school in the next two years.

Successful seasons like the 2023 campaign drew more interest into the boys volleyball program. That enthusiasm is vital to becoming like Walnut Hills in not having good seasons but fostering a program that rebuilds and avoids down seasons.

"It is definitely headed in the right direction," Boeing said of the Taylor program. "A lot of people will tell you that success for any high school program starts when kids are in third or fourth grade. I think we're on the right track."

This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: Taylor wants to follow Walnut Hills in boys volleyball trajectory