Rome was not built in a day.

That is kind of the type of motto that the Emmaus boys volleyball team may have used to open its 2019 regular season. It took five sets to win the season-opening match against Liberty two weeks ago, after a 2018 campaign that saw the Green Hornets win every Eastern Pennsylvania Conference match via a 3-0 sweep.

But Emmaus has seemed to find itself, winning its next two matches in three sets, and did so again at rival Parkland Monday night, defeating the Trojans 3-0 by scores of 25-20, 25-15 and 25-23.

“I think we’re just playing with a lot more confidence,” said sophomore setter Gannon Defrain. “We’re working hard at practice and in games and we’re just learning how to play with each other every day. We’re getting used to each other each day and playing as a team, not as individuals.”

Defrain is playing confident for an underclassman starting his first year on varsity, following in the footsteps of a successful program leader in former EPC MVP Cam Parsons, who graduated after last season.

But getting high school experience as a first-year player last year on JV, and seeing Parsons play each day in 2018, helped Defrain get to the point that he is at today.

“He helped me a lot,” Defrain said. “Really just the pace of varsity and different sets and techniques that I needed to get better at. I was glad to be able to learn from him last year.”

With the score in favor of Emmaus 11-10 in the opening set, the Green Hornets scored the next four points against Parkland. But the advantage slowly went away and the score was knotted at 20-20 last in the game. From there, Emmaus took over and tallied five straight points to take set one.

The Hornets used that momentum and carried it into a more comfortable 25-15 set two victory where a 13-11 edge turned into 20-13 quickly.

Finishing out the three-set sweep proved to be a little more difficult.

In the third set there were 10 ties and four lead changes. Emmaus held the lead early on, recording the first two points, but Parkland bounced back to be out in front for the next run of points. The Trojans were ahead 14-11, but the Hornets posted six of the next nine points to tie the score at 17-17. Emmaus then tallied the next three and never trailed again. Parkland did not go down without a fight, however, tying the score at 23-23 before the Hornets took the next two to seal the victory.

“We just had to settle down and just know that we needed to pass well and our hitters will get the ball down,” said Defrain. “We just had to keep our heads up and keep playing strong. We figured it out and got the win.”

Defrain finished with 29 assists and four digs. Stephen Reynolds led Emmaus with 12 kills and four digs. Ethan Parvel tallied five kills, seven digs and two blocks, and Harrison Dottery recorded 17 digs.

Emmaus hosts Bethlehem Catholic Wednesday before traveling to take on Dieruff on Friday.