Gators’ Hill notches 400th career victory

There was no back-and-forth, fifth-game winner in a tight match Thursday at Green Valley. But the Gators’ 25-6, 25-12, 25-21 victory over Palo Verde was a special one, nonetheless.

Green Valley coach Erin Hill picked up her 400th win with the Gators, though she took a business-as-usual approach to the milestone.

“It has to be; that’s how you have to take every match,” Hill said. “Every match is one point, one game at a time, and one match at a time. If you treat them any differently, that’s when you start getting a roller-coaster ride, and we don’t want that with a young team. So it’s business as usual; let’s get the job done.”

The win was extra special for outside hitter Emma Johnson, a senior who has played varsity all four seasons.

“It’s a big deal. I’ve been here for four years — I don’t know how many wins I’ve been in, but it’s nice to be a part of her 400th one,” said Johnson, who led Green Valley with 12 kills and eight aces.

Gators sophomore Jenna Swaffer compiled 25 kills and four aces.

A Las Vegas native, Hill played volleyball, basketball and softball at Valley, where she led the Vikings to state volleyball titles in 1977 and 1978.

After attending Utah and UNLV, she landed at Green Valley, where she has taught health and coached volleyball since the school’s inception in 1991.

In the past two decades, the Gators have won four state championships in seven finals appearances.

Hill has been named coach of the year five times by the Southern Nevada Volleyball Coaches Association and received the Nevada Interscholastic Activities Association Model Coach of the Year award in 2005.

“(The administration) is so great,” the 20th-year head coach said. “They’re so kind to me, and I wouldn’t do it any place else but Green Valley High School.”

Hill thinks the first class of athletes set the tone for Green Valley’s storied volleyball program. The Gators finished undefeated in league play, and each class has strived to meet and exceed that high standard.

“When the standard is set so high, everybody else has to rise up to it,” Hill added. “Year after year, the kids know the tradition of Gator volleyball and they know what they’re getting themselves into. Sometimes it’s hard, and they struggle with that once they’re in it, but they never give up.”

Johnson acknowledged that the milestone win and home-court advantage played a factor in Green Valley’s sweep of the Panthers.

“We knew from the start that this was going to be our game; this is our home court,” she said. “And the 400th win — there was no doubt we were going to get this one today.

“We’re going to be expecting bigger, a lot more.”

But for the only volleyball coach Green Valley has known, it was still business as usual.

“We’re looking forward to Vegas on Tuesday,” Hill said.