Boys volleyball: Hersey hangs on to edge Meadows

It sure didn't seem like a conference-opening match Tuesday night at Hersey.

Especially in the latter stages of the second set.

With visiting Rolling Meadows and the host Huskies playing superior defense, the intensity level for both teams kept ratcheting up as the set went on.

Hersey was finally able to stem the tide of a Mustangs' rally to outlast Meadows 25-21, 29-27 in the Mid-Suburban East boys volleyball victory.

"My hat's off to them," said Hersey senior setter Vince Reisel of the rival Mustangs. "They played great, but our team showed a lot of character to be able to push through."

Reisel finished with 27 assists on 67-of-68 setting while teammates Justin Hong and Christian Castro led the defensive charge with 15 digs apiece.

"It was crazy and intense tonight," said Hersey coach Nancy Lill, whose team is 2-1 overall "We were a little sluggish at the start, but we persevered."

Arthur Barczak led Meadows (2-5) with 8 kills on 20-of-23 hitting and was a game-changing force in the middle for the Mustangs.

"It was a loss," said Mustangs coach Kevin Bourn. "But when you play a barnburner like this against a team like Hersey, who'll likely be at the top of the standings at the end, you've got to feel encouraged. Art (Barczak) was great blocking in the middle and we also got some surprising play from Tom Unti and Max (Sobkowicz)."

Barczak earned 3 straight 'how-did-he-do-that?' block kills in the middle of set one to give the visitors a short-lived advantage.

But Hersey came back to win behind the hitting of Camran Saeed (10 kills).

Meadows went on a 6-point run in the middle of the second set to take a commanding lead, However, following a time out, Hersey rallied for a 24-24 tie.

"At that point it was all about serve receive," said Hersey junior Andrew Leno as to what fueled the Huskies' rally. "We were able to lock that in. We expected a strong defensive effort from Meadows tonight, and that's what we got."

Meadows surged ahead 27-26 after, what else, a block kill in the middle from Kyle Kornblum.

Then Hersey scored the next 3 points to win.

First Leno had a kill. Meadows hit the antenna on the next rally to send Hersey to the brink of a victory.

Reisel set up Leno perfectly for the final match-winning kill.

"We've got some great guys on this team," Leno said. "And a lot of us have played club together so we've got some great chemistry."

Patrick O'Brien hit 8 kills for Hersey while teammates Hong and Castro were each 8-of-9 from the service line with an ace.

Kornblum had 2 aces for Meadows while Szymon Kleniuk collected 14 digs.

"The last couple of years we've been 2-8 and 3-7 in conference," Bourn said. "I don't know a single guy on this team who'll be happy with that this year. These guys just keep improving day by day.".