MINERSVILLE – The daily number players would have loved it.

Panther Valley enjoyed it.

The Panthers swept Tri-Valley in the quarterfinal round of the Schuylkill League volleyball playoffs by nearly identical scores, rolling to a 25-14, 25-14, 25-16 victory on Monday.

One could imagine if all three sets of numbers would have been the same and the Pennsylvania Lotto machines would have been blinking 2514 throughout the Panther Valley area.

The numbers do tell the story as Panther Valley breezed into the semifinals in grand fashion where they’ll face familiar foe Nativity tonight at 5:30 p.m. at Martz Hall.

Panther coach Emily Baker made sure her team wasn’t just going through the motions despite being a strong favorite. PV put the pedal to the floor immediately.

“We made sure not to come in here overconfident,” Baker said. “Tri-Valley is a very scrapy team. When you leave teams like them in a game, they can hurt you.”

That wasn’t going to happen, however, as the Panthers rode the play of their sensational senior leader and last season’s Times-News Player of the Year, Riley McArdle.

McArdle had four of her game-high 14 kills in the opening set as Panther Valley wasted no time in asserting its dominance as Panther Valley jumped ahead 11-7, and stretched it to 18-9, before closing it out with a 7-5 run.

“Because we were down one of our players (injury), we had to work extra hard,” Baker said. “We wanted to make sure everyone knew their new roles and positions.”

The Panthers were ahead 18-14 in set two before McArdle took the wheel and ran off seven straight service points to put the Bulldogs away.

“We didn’t have it,” said Tri-Valley coach Courtney Campbell about her team’s inability to play with the Panthers. “They can intimidate you.”

The Panthers kept the heat on to open the final set taking a commanding 18-7 lead by turning to a group of standouts. If Maddison Maynard wasn’t drilling home key returns, then it was Abby Benack or Abby Dacey or Lucey Greco. They then closed it out in strong fashion with Dacey reeling off the final four points from the service line.

STAYING PERFECT … The Panthers are now 18-1 overall. It was the second win over Tri-Valley this season.

COUNTING ‘EM UP … McArdle had another big outing with two aces, 14 kills and 6 digs. Caroline Breslin recorded 27 digs and an ace. Benack stood out with her 27 assists and 12 digs.