Huskies systematically win again

Naperville North's girls volleyball team stresses being "in system."

All systems appear to be go for the Huskies right now.

Naperville North remained unbeaten on the young season with a convincing 25-13, 25-21 win over Glenbard East on Thursday in Lombard.

The Huskies (8-0, 2-0 DuPage Valley Conference) showed off their strength in numbers, with Audrey Wilson knocking down 7 kills, Kaia Schwartz 5 and Nrithya Sundararaman 5. Jordan Pappas dished out 13 assists and Julie Chin had 15 digs.

"When we're in system," Naperville North coach Jennifer Urban said, "and serving to targets, we can use a lot of hitters."

Count Glenbard East as impressed. The Rams pride themselves on scrappy defense but had little answer for Naperville North in Game 1. After spotting Glenbard East an early 5-0 lead, the Huskies dominated after that. Down 8-7 Naperville North ran off 13 of the game's next 15 points for a 20-10 lead. Five Huskies had kills in the first game.

"They are a very solid offensive team. Anybody can hit the ball," Glenbard East coach Marci Maier said. "That puts a lot of of pressure on the defense. And Chin did a good job digging out a lot of balls that would have been kills."

Sidney Sauter finished off the first game with a pair of kills.

"We had good consistent serving, serving to zones," said Pappas, who had a pair of aces. "We run different plays on free balls, move the ball around to different players. That keeps other teams off-balance."

Glenbard East came back strong in the second game behind the hitting of do-all senior Amanda Peterson, after an early 5-0 hole. The teams tied five times, and the host Rams took a 19-18 lead on a Natalie Rizzo kill. But Wilson had 3 kills down the stretch to give the Huskies back the momentum for good.

"It gives you confidence when you can run your offense effectively," Wilson said. "Jordan can set anybody, and we have a lot of faith in our hitters."

Peterson had 9 kills, 4 blocks and 4 assists for Glenbard East (5-3, 1-1). Stephanie Sulzer added 15 digs, Brittany Cardott 6 assists and Nikki Hall 4 blocks.

"Not to take anything away from Naperville North, but we could have played better," Maier said. "Good teams sometimes make you play that way, though."

- Joshua Welge

Neuqua Valley d. St. Charles North: Neuqua Valley coach Kelly Simon knew through her team's first two games this season that serving would be one of the Wildcats' biggest strengths.

In Neuqua Valley's conference opener against St. Charles North in Naperville, Simon's affirmations were again confirmed. The Wildcats aced St. Charles North eight times in the first game alone, pacing the home team to a 25-17, 26-24 victory.

Simon felt particularly pleased with the Wildcats' consistency in Game 1, where Neuqua Valley (3-0, 2-0 Upstate Eight Conference) produced a majority of its points by strong play instead of North Stars' unforced errors.

"We served really, really tough the first game," Simon said. "To win our first game 25-17, I think, says a lot for us, that we earned 20 of the 25 by blocks, kills and aces."

Tides turned in the second game, where Neuqua Valley had just 3 aces and 5 service errors. An increase in intensity from the North Stars had St. Charles North in front for most of the second game and positioned the visitors at game point.

- Matthew McClarey

Naperville Central d. West Aurora: There were not too many breaks to be had by West Aurora in Naperville.

A young Blackhawks squad traveled to Naperville Central to take on a Redhawks team that played superb defense and made few hitting errors. The result was a 25-9, 25-7 DuPage Valley Conference victory that improved the hosts to 3-0 on the year and 2-0 in league lpay this week.

West Aurora (3-4-1, 1-1) took an early 3-2 lead in the opener but Naperville Central used a 7-1 run to take comand of the game. Outside hitter Mary Carroll had a kill during the Redhawks run, but most of the points saw Naperville Central's defense keep the ball alive until the Blackhawks made a mistake. Devin Vaughn snapped the streak with a kill for West Aurora, but the hosts then went on a 12-0 run on their way to an easy Game 1 triumph. Chelsea Thurlby served up 8 straight points for Naperville Central to help it claim the game.

The second game was more of the same, as libero Jill Fields led Naperville Central's defensive charge on her way to 14 digs for the night.

"I thought we did a good job of keeping the ball off the floor," Naperville Central coach Brie Isaacson said. "We haven't played in a tournament yet, so this is just our third match and we're not as crisp as I'd like to see. But I'm proud of the way we played defense."

Senior Emily McGee had 6 kills for Naperville Central and Meghan Bray added 4.

"It's still early in the season and they showed us some things we can work on," McGee said. "But I think we played pretty well. Some years it (attack) has been kind of one-sided, but this year you don't know where we're going to come at you from since we're so balanced."

- Stan Goff

Boys soccer

Wheaton North 1, Glenbard East 0: It took Wheaton North 57 minutes to solve a consistently tough Glenbard East defense in Wheaton.

The Falcons (5-0-2) earned their first DuPage Valley Conference win, while the Rams fell to 2-4-2 overall, and 0-2 in the conference.

"I think we can go far this year," said Falcons senior Mike Fernald, who scored the game's lone goal. "We just need to come out a little harder."

Wheaton North far and away put the lion's share of shots on net in the game putting 10 shots on frame while allowing the Rams a trio of shots on the night.

"(Rams coach Josh Adler) always has his teams incredibly organized, and when we put pressure on them they never got rattled," said Falcons coach Bryce Cann. "We just had to stay patient, and have some faith that eventually we'd break through."

James Waterman served a ball from the corner in the second half to Fernald, who took a touch 14 yards out and buried it near post. Pat Langan, Mike Hible and Mike Tworek all stood out, while a Rams back line led by Nick Roth and Sean Little fought tooth and nail throughout.

The Rams have competed well all season, but remain in search of that age-old chief ingredient for a win.

"We've got to score goals," Adler said.

- Gary Larsen

$CLASS=breakhead$Girls tennis

Neuqua Valley 6 St. Charles North 1: The addition of a freshman to the top of a singles lineup can have an immediate and dramatic impact of an entire team.

Neuqua Valley showed just how much of an impact as it rode freshman Emily Myers' win over Annemijn Koenen at No. 1 singles to capture the team competition at St. Charles North in an Upstate Eight Conference showdown.

"I go into a match like this feeling pretty relaxed because I know I've got nothing to lose," Myers said.

After a very tight first set, Myers started to get into a rhythm against Koenen, who was a bit under the weather, and won the match, 7-5, 6-2.

"In the first set I knew if I could win one game when the wind was at her back, I could do really well," Myers said. "Once I won the first set my confidence was very high and I started going for every shot, and that worked out really well."

The emergence of Myers has allowed Neuqua Valley coach Trudy Bennorth to move players around and strengthen her lineup from top to bottom.

"I'm really proud of (Myers). She gets a game plan and sticks to it," Bennorth said. "She has a great attitude, she fits right in, and she's very coachable," Bennorth said. "She's totally easy going but very competitive."

- Henry Perez