No. 5 Ironwood Ridge responded to difficult starts with lengthy and devastating runs to get past No. 12 Cactus Shadows in straight sets. The Nighthawks (14-4 in ranking matches) will move to the 4A quarterfinal round where the team will face No. 4 Mica Mountain (15-2) on the road after the Thunderbolts beat No. 13 ALA-Queen Creek by a score of 3-1 in the opening round. All of the higher seeds won their first round matches except for No. 7 Mesquite, who lost to No. 10 ALA-Gibert North in straight sets.

In the first set, Cactus Shadows built an 11-9 lead only to see the Nighthawks close it out on 16-3 run for the 25-14 win. In the second set, the Falcons went up 11-6 but Ironwood Ridge went on another run to take a 16-12 lead. Cactus Shadows tied it back up 16-16 only to see Ironwood Ridge go back up 20-17. The Falcons scored five straight to take a commanding 22-20 lead, and then 23-21, but Ironwood Ridge scored four straight for the 25-23 victory to go up 2-0.

“We don't have anybody who started in the state playoffs and so we talked about how we're going to be in a little bit of a rut, we're going to have to analyze them a little bit,” Ironwood Ridge head coach Bill Lang said about the slow starts in each set.

“But our serving has always been something that's kept us going and, once our serving got better, then our defense led to some points scored. Once our defense kind of led to scores. Then we got a little bit more comfortable moving forward. But yeah we were a little nervous a few times.”

The Falcons went up 4-0 in the deciding set but the Nighthawks responded once again with a massive run to take the set 25-12. Cactus Shadows graduates five seniors and the team made it to the semifinal round in 2021. Mica Mountain and Ironwood Ridge compete in the 4A Kino Region and the programs split this year.