Honorable outcome for Patel, Conant at Rolling Meadows

After Conant's 25-8, 26-24 victory at Rolling Meadows on Tuesday night, Dhara Patel scooted out of the gymnasium as fast as she served the Cougars to a 17-3 lead in Set 1.

With her team ahead 6-3, Patel reeled off 11 straight points in the opening set to get the Cougars off and rolling in the Mid-Suburban League girls volleyball crossover match.

When asked what her secret was, she responded "concentration."

The Conant senior libero also knows something about concentrating somewhere else - the classroom.

The reason she and several of her teammates raced out of the gym was to attend the National Honor Society Recognition Night at the school's auditorium.

That group included varsity regulars Elisa Ambrose, Rachel Delanois, Danielle Engelbreit, Hannah Lee and manager Nate Armando.

"We have a very smart team from player one all the way through," said Conant first-year coach Drewann Pancratz. "They're all great kids off the court, too."

Patel's great service run on the court included 3 aces and she finished 14-of-14 at the line along with 10 digs.

"She served tough," Pancratz said of the A honor roll student. "And she is a huge factor in the back row for us. She leads us on the court and had done a good job from day one to now in really taking charge in the back row which we like to see."

Pancratz also saw service aces from Wachal, DeeDee Durr and Elisa Ambrose, who handed out 13 assists.

"We just came out real strong in Set 1," said Ambrose, who is an all-area center fielder in softball. "We were changing up our attackers."

The Cougars' top attacker was Delanois with 7 kills, followed by Alyssa Wachal (6), Durr (4), Jorie Wachal (3) and Katie Lomas (2).

Leading Meadows on attack were Hannah Mickey (4 kills), Jenny Srnak 8-12 (3 kills) and Gabby Johns (2 kills).

Sarah Deitelhoff, Laura Kallal and Nora Rasche were honored for Seniors's Night prior to the match and all started.

"We tried a different lineup and the seniors didn't hurt at all," said Mustangs coach Joe Di Silvio, who received 8 assists from setter Megan King and 4 from Megan Mich. "We just couldn't pass and we made too many errors in the first set.

Conant (14-18) built a 19-12 lead in Set 2 but the Mustangs (8-27) didn't fold.

Behind the serve of King, they tied the set at 21-21 and it was tied at 23 and 24 before Conant wrapped it up on a service point by Jorie Wachal.

"At a time out when it was 19-12, I told our girls they could still come back," Di Silvio said. "We just weren't playing Rolling Meadows volleyball. But then we started to play and got back into the set. We struggled at the service line, though."