Girls volleyball: Prospect girls right at home dropping first set again

When you are the setter playing for your mother's girls volleyball team, you can imagine the chatter around the house.

"Volleyball is the only topic of conversation," said Knights senior setter Paige Gerber.

So on Thursday night, the conversation in the Gerber household was made much easier thanks to a terrific comeback by coach Laura's Knights.

Trailing host Rolling Meadows 17-11 in a must-win Set 2, the Knights scored 39 of the next 54 points to keep a surprising season trend alive with a 17-25, 25-21, 25-11 triumph in the Mid-Suburban East opener.

Prospect is now 4-1 and has lost the first set of all five matches.

As one Knights fan said leaving the gymnasium, "it makes things a lot harder on the grandparents."

"I don't know why that is happening," said Laura Gerber, who is in her second season directing the program, regarding the first-set losses. "I think they like to come back and make it exciting."

Paige Gerber and the Knights never lost their cool in the second set and began their rally with a kill from senior Maggie Porwit and an ace from classmate Kaela Myers which closed the deficit to 17-13.

Gerber's block got the Knights to within 19-18 and an ace by Porwit tied the set at 20-20.

A kill and two errors by Meadows gave the visitors a 23-20 lead. A service error got Meadows to within 23-21 before Prospect completed its rally with kills from Mandy Withey and Myers, off a set from Gerber (27 assists in the match).

"We just have to keep each other up," said Paige about the Knights' uncanny ability to fight back from the first set losses. "We were really down after the first set, but we realize we have to keep encouraging other. "We have to keep moving the ball around and trying to keep the other team distracted."

The Knights obviously succeeded as they pulled away to a commanding 11-3 lead in the decisive set.

Gerber started it with three straight service points, including 2 kills from Porwit, one off an overpass.

Porwit's ace made it 11-3 and Meadows never got closer than 15-7 when senior outside hitter Maddie Sellergren put down a kill.

"We lost momentum and just never got it back," said Mustangs coach Joe Di Silvio, whose team is 6-4. "All of a sudden we couldn't keep our focus on the game.

"Kudos to Prospect for staying calm, cool and collected all the time and never wavering off that."

Part of the reason for that can be credited to calm demeanor of Paige Gerber, who would also like to coach volleyball one day like her mother, who played at Maine South. Paige plans to study elementary education at Illinois State.

"It's hard sometimes, but we work well together," Paige said of having her mom as coach.

Just like she worked well with her attackers on Thursday, distributing assists to Porwit (9 kills), Myers (8), Withey (8) and Mary Mazurek (4).

Meghan Meredith played a key role at the service line with 3 aces while Withey and Myers each had 2 blocks and Mazurek 1.

The back row kept the Knights' attack aggressive as Valerie Thomas led the way with 20 digs, followed by Myers (14) and Kendra Gancarz (12).

The Mustangs surged to a 7-1 lead in Set 1 and never looked back.

An ace by Gerber got the Knights to within 17-13 but senior Katie Zanocco got the Mustangs back on track with a block kill followed by Macie Robinson's ace for a 19-13 cushion.

Robinson, a 5-foot-4 libero who made a terrific all-out forward dive for a dig which led to a Mustang point in set 2, finished with 11 digs.

The hosts put away the first set on a service point Sellergren with sophomore Eleanor Errico blocking an overpass for the 25th point,

Sellergren led Meadows with 11 kills followed by Zanocco (6), Madeline Rebsamen (3), Errico (2) and Kyra Amundson (2).

Zanocco also had 4 blocks while Mallory King (11 assists) and Natalie Klancnik (9 assists) set the Meadows' attack.