It may have been a timeout that saved a district championship.

Trailing 23-21 against Emmaus and staring their first set loss of the season right in the face, Parkland head coach Scott Trumbauer called a timeout.

That break in the action not only turned around that first set against Emmaus, but it very well could have given the Trojans the momentum they needed.

Top-seeded Parkland rallied to take the next three points to win the opening game of the district championship match, 25-23. Emmaus, the No. 2 seed, wasn't able to respond the rest of the way as the Trojans captured their second straight District 11 Class AAA championship with a 3-0 sweep against the Hornets (25-23, 25-17, 25-23) last Thursday at Liberty High School.

"If you look at it, not many teams really had the opportunity or the ability to win two in a row, nonetheless do it two times in a row," Trumbauer said. "It's such a long season, and you have to get lucky with many things in terms of avoiding injuries and all of these other things that are outside the realm of the 30-by-30 court that we play on."

"It's cool that we're fortunate enough to have the players to do that [win back-to-back district titles]," said junior Jake Heyer, who didn't play varsity minutes a year ago.

Coming out of that timeout, the message was simple: relax and stay focused.

Trumbauer's players took that to heart after seeing a 17-14 advantage disappear. A kill by Kyle Stout out of the break got the Trojans to within a point, and a block and kill from Sean Lewis on back-to-back points gave Parkland the lead back at 24-23. Heyer's service ace cemented the opening set victory.

"We could have easily put our heads down and just lost that game," Heyer said. "It could have been a completely different turnout. It's really good that we pushed to win that game."

"Every single time we play Emmaus, it's always going to be highly contested," Trumbauer said. "We're going to be holding our breath because we don't know what's going to happen. When it comes down to it, it's one or two plays in games like this that can make or break your entire game."

While they trailed 6-5 early in the second set, there would be no hangover from that first game. The Trojans quickly responded to take a 16-10 advantage on back-to-back points from Andrew Hillman. That lead grew to as many as eight points late, 22-14, when Loren Skinker assisted on Justin Bond's kill.

Much of the third set proved to be like the second game, with the teams staying close through the early going before the Trojans built up a 20-13 lead. This time, however, Emmaus wouldn't let the district championship get away without a fight.

The Hornets got back into the game at 22-18 on Mitchell Sterkenburg's kill and trailed by just a point with match point on the line for the Trojans at 24-23. Parkland's Andrew Micheletti, however, set up Matt Kiser nicely in front of the net for the decisive match-winning kill.

"It was really about staying focused," Trumbauer said. "It's very easy to lose focus and things like that. Suddenly a big point happens and you're down match point.

"I always try to make sure that they realize that it doesn't matter anything about what happened in the past."

It was the fourth time-including a match at the Koller Classic Invitational-that the Trojans defeated Emmaus in straight sets.

"The difference between the matches early in the season and this one was there wasn't a district title on the line," Trumbauer said. "They know the ramifications and the history of winning a district title. You just tend to play better that way."

The win advanced both teams to the PIAA Class AAA Championships that began on Wednesday. As the No. 1 seed out of District 11, the Trojans faced District 1's Council Rock North in Wednesday's opening round. Results were not available at time of press.

"Our goal is to definitely contend," Heyer said. "We would love to win. Everyone would love to win. But we definitely want to contend, and we have high expectations for ourselves."