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Pleasant Grove's Marly McCandless (11) sets the ball during a Region 7 girls volleyball match against Maple Mountain on Tuesday, Sept. 1, 2026.

Darnell Dickson, Daily Herald

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The Pleasant Grove girls volleyball team celebrates a point in a Region 7 match against Maple Mountain on Tuesday, Sept. 1, 2026.

Darnell Dickson, Daily Herald

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Pleasant Grove's Lexi Brown (7) takes a swing against the Maple Mountain block in a Region 7 girls volleyball match on Tuesday, Sept. 1, 2026.

Darnell Dickson, Daily Herald

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Maple Mountain's Keely Mahaffey (19) takes a swing against Pleasant Grove in a Region 7 girls volleyball match on Tuesday, Sept. 1, 2026.

Darnell Dickson, Daily Herald

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Pleasant Grove girls volleyball coach Isa Takahashi (kneeling) watches a match against Maple Mountain on Tuesday, Sept. 1, 2026.

Darnell Dickson, Daily Herald

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The Maple Mountain girls volleyball team celebrates a point in a Region 7 match against Pleasant Grove on Tuesday, Sept. 1, 2026.

Darnell Dickson, Daily Herald

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Maple Mountain's Adison Thornton (13) sets the ball in a Region 7 girls volleyball match against Pleasant Grove on Tuesday, Sept. 1, 2026.

Darnell Dickson, Daily Herald

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Maple Mountain's Olivia Roberts serves the ball in a Region 7 girls volleyball match against Pleasant Grove on Tuesday, Sept. 1, 2026.

Darnell Dickson, Daily Herald

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The Pleasant Grove girls volleyball team celebrates an ace serve in a Region 7 match against Maple Mountain on Tuesday, Sept. 1, 2026.

Darnell Dickson, Daily Herald

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Pleasant Grove's Adrianna Warren serves the ball in a Region 7 girls volleyball match against Maple Mountain on Tuesday, Sept. 1, 2026.

Darnell Dickson, Daily Herald

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Before matches, Pleasant Grove girls volleyball coach Isa Takahashi takes his player’s cell phones and lines them up next to each other on the scorer’s table.

He said he wants the players to focus on the game but more importantly, on cheering for their teammates.

The process is working.

The Vikings moved to 8-1 overall and 1-0 in 5A Region 7 play on Tuesday, fighting off a good Maple Mountain team in a 3-1 ( (25-22, 25-18, 23-25, 25-20) victory.

“So we’re mostly juniors, and then one senior right now,” Takahashi said. “I love what I’m seeing. They’re still hungry for growth. Yeah, they make their errors, but they’re making good decisions in those moments the majority of the time.”

Charged with making a lot of those decision is junior setter Marley McCandless, one of the top players in the state who committed to Rob Neilson and the BYU women’s volleyball program over the summer. McCandless is 6-foot-2 — “she’ll probably be 6-3, 6-4 by the time she’s done,” Takahashi said  — and creates some interesting matchup issues with her size and skill.

“She’s just physical,” Takahashi said. “She turns OK passes into normal, good or great passes. She’s great at attacking. She’s one of my best attackers on the court right now and I think she’s hitting over .500 this season. She’s just a blessing to have. Dixie (Werner) is also a great setter on the back row, but you look at how they work together and they’re just great teammates. I love seeing how this group, this team, interacts.”

McCandless said she started playing competitive club volleyball at age eight.

“I’ve just always played and I’m super competitive in this game,” she said. “It just brings my competitiveness out, so I just love like the competitive aspect of it. We’re just playing as a team, for sure. We have a lot of drive and we like playing for each other. We put trust in our teammates, even when it gets hard.”

Last season, Pleasant Grove advanced to the 5A semifinals behind big contributions from senior middle blockers Taytum Nelson and Molly Mitchell, now playing at Utah State and Southern Utah, respectively. This season, McCandless (8.9 assists per set) is consistently feeding high-flying outside hitter Lexie Brown, the team’s only senior who is averaging 4.2 kills per set. The offensive contributions from junior Addyson Pace and newcomers Gabby Moffitt, Charlee Dailey and Adriana Warren are growing each match.

“I’m for sure trying to gain a connection with them because I feel like last year at the beginning I also had to gain a connection,” McCandless said. “We’re getting a lot of good connection, and you can see how it’s improving. We’re getting a lot of kills.”

On Tuesday, Maple Mountain got off to quick leads in the first three sets but Pleasant Grove recovered to win the first two. Set 3 was tied at 23-all but the Golden Eagles scored the final two points, getting a kill from Shea Workman and forcing a PG hitting error for the 25-23 victory.

Maple Mountain led Set 4 11-8 but Werner swung the momentum with strong service pressure. She had back-to-back aces and led a 6-0 Vikings run, turning the score around at 14-11. Down the stretch, PG got a service ace and a kill from Brown, a kill from Daley and combo block from McCandless and Warren to finish off a 25-20 win at the match victory.

“This is probably my most complete volleyball team,” Takahashi said. “They make really good decisions and there’s not one person who has to carry the team. Lexi just nukes the ball from the outside, but she has a great supporting cast. There are a lot of players on this team that just work their butts off, and our middles hold the blocker, so we have seams because we run such a fast offense. They’re coming in hard every single time, getting up and they’re bettering the ball on a crazy play, which I’m grateful for.”

Pleasant Grove, whose only loss is to one of 6A’s top teams (Lone Peak), is at Timpview on Thursday.

Maple Mountain (4-4 overall, 1-1 Region 7) hosts the T-Birds next Tuesday.