Glenbard West seniors celebrate with win over St. Charles North
For a fleeting moment Thursday, Glenbard West senior Jackson Nagle felt like a freshman boys volleyball player again.
The Hilltoppers celebrated senior night, and coach Christine Mayer let several of the seven seniors play together during their home finale against Upstate Eight River champion St. Charles North.
"We really focused on having fun and leaving with a good impression," Nagle said.
"It was kind of reminiscent of when we were all on freshman A, just flashbacks to that. We hadn't really been together before that point because everybody moved to different (levels). It was nice to see everyone on the same team playing at the same time."
As for this season, those Hilltoppers contribute to one of the strongest teams in the state. They concluded the program's most successful regular season at 33-2 with a 25-18, 25-16 victory over the North Stars (22-12).
Glenbard West (2014) and St. Charles North (2013) have finished third at the state finals over the past two seasons.
Nagle led Glenbard West with 9 kills. Other standouts included seniors Eric Button and Parker Swartz and junior setter Paulie Bischoff.
Seniors Brendan Donlevy, junior Drew Lanz and sophomore Danny Throop led the North Stars.
Mayer unsuccessfully tried to hide that Thursday was her birthday. She also was unable to complete her pre-match speech praising her seniors - Nagle, Button, Swartz, libero Ryan Condon, Garrett Dickson, Michael Marchetti and Mark Meyers.
All seven were academic all-conference. The only home loss for any of them was Nagle and Swartz with the 2013 varsity against Downers Grove South.
"It was so emotional. I had a paragraph (remaining). I just couldn't do it," Mayer said. "I'm really happy for the kids. (Senior night) was everything I wanted it to be. It's over now and everything we've done now doesn't matter. We just get ready for the next season."
Glenbard West led 5-0 and by as much as 22-10 in the first game. The North Stars gained momentum in the second game and overcame a 10-5 deficit to close to 16-15.
After a Glenbard West timeout, Will Church got a sideout kill and Nagle served the next four points, which included his consecutive kills from the back row.
"We're just ready for every situation," Nagle said. "On the serving run, everybody was helping out. We had a big block and nobody was letting the ball hit the floor so it was really a team effort."
St. Charles North welcomed the challenge after winning its third straight conference title to lead a combined undefeated conference season by all four levels.
The North Stars are the No. 1 seed at the Geneva regional and probably will have to get past UEC rivals and fellow No. 1 regional seed Lake Park at the Harlem sectional. The North Stars and Hilltoppers could meet again in the state quarterfinals.
"I thought it was a good match, especially when we were neck and neck for a while there in the second set," St. Charles North coach Todd Weimer said.
"We've kind of been in a funk. We did a much better job tonight. Obviously, it didn't show on the scoreboard. I thought our serve receive was really good, serving was good, our effort and scrappiness trying to get after balls was much better."
The No. 1 seed at the Oswego East sectional, Glenbard West ended its regular season winning 12 straight. All but one of this season's victories were in two games.
The Hilltoppers are just two victories from equaling last year's school-record 35-7. This playoff run could include a sectional final rematch with No. 3-seed Benet, the last team to beat the Hilltoppers May 2 at the Benet Invite.
"Just as long as we stay focused and keep playing the way we have, and most importantly if we play together and trust each other, then I think we can do something really amazing this postseason," Condon said.
"We're done with school before the season's over. I'm going to remember this team, not anything else. Just this run's been kind of magical for me."