Pinley notches 500th as Fremd sweeps tourney
Fremd coach Curt Pinley won his 500th high school varsity volleyball match (girls and boys combined) as his girls team won the Grayslake North Invite on Saturday.
Pinley, a former Palatine boys volleyball coach and current Fremd boys coach, watched his girls win all five of their matches in two games.
The Vikings stopped Mundelein 25-7, 25-20 for the title.
Kaitlin Pascus (21 kills), Stephanie Alesia (20), Tess Dinterman (17) and Alex Messner (15) led the attack, set by Natalie Bruck (64 assists) and Kayla Price (41 assists). Sara Welsh had 6 digs and was 28-of-35 serve receiving.
The Vikings improved to 22-5 as they head into key Mid-Suburban League West Division matches against Hoffman Estates on Tuesday and Conant on Wednesday.
St Charles invite: Rockford Guilford beat Barrington for 19th place by scores of 26-24, 25-23.
The Fillies (7-19) began the day with their lone win of the tournament over Barnstable (25-15, 25-16).
"It was good in the fact that we played with emotional consistency from start to finish," said Barrington coach Chris Bronke. "To establish some sort of team emotional identity was huge for us. This wasn't about the wins for us because I still think we can be a team that is ready to go in the postseason."
Schaumburg Invite: Schaumburg took third place at its own tournament by outlasting Larkin 25-15, 21-25, 25-21.
The Saxons (9-18) swept through morning pool play with a three-game win over Larkin (8-23) and convincing victories over Mather and Hononegah.
Schaumburg advanced to the championship round but was swept by eventual champion Crystal Lake South (20-6) 25-8, 25-21. Nevertheless, the Saxons considered a 4-1 showing a successful day's work.
"Our goal is to continue to make baby steps and improve in our execution of play," said Saxons coach Jeannette Pancratz. "I challenged them to see if they can be a better team at the end of the day compared to the beginning of the day, and we accomplished that.
"We're developing some consistency in our play and a little more intensity and focus than we've had. We want to keep working to be the best we can be come state tournament time."
The Saxons' Sarah McGinn had 28 kills, and Jenny Dolan added 26 kills.
Glenbrook North Invite: Rachel Hunt (24 kills), Tracey Hefferan (19) and Sarah Hunt (12) were top attackers for Prospect (12-15), which went 2-3 in the tourney.
Buffalo Grove (4-20-2) was 1-4, led by Katie Quill and Jackie Sisi (12 kills apiece) on attack.
Maine West (17-9) went 3-2 and placed fifth. Alise Tupuritis (59 kills) and Emily Ott (18 kills) led the Warriors' attack.
Crystal Lake Invite: Krystina Leazer (39 kills), Katie Loos (20) and Jessica Condon (17) paced the Elk Grove attack as the Grenadiers (18-8) went 3-2 in the tourney. Kelsey Prochenski distributed 44 assists, while Jessica Condon handed out 30.
Lake Zurich Invite: Rolling Meadows (10-17) went 2-3 in the tourney as Dana Demmert (26 kills) and Katie Stensland (23) led the attack.
Girls cross country
Sterling Invite: The Schaumburg girls cross country team scored 65 points and took home the top prize as sophomore Colette Falsey set a course record with her time of 17:45.
Classmate Britten Petrey ran third (18:10), while Conant's Kalli Dalton was fourth (18:11) to help the Cougars take fourth place with 139.
Sophomore Karen Lesiewicz was 11th for Schaumburg, followed by junior Nora Ferguson (24th) and freshman Kelsey Steenstrup (26th).
"All our kids ran a lot faster than they did last year here," said Saxons coach Jon Macnider. "They all ran their personal-best times. It was fun to see. And only one senior (Janet Franco) ran for us in the race."
It marked the first invite title for the Schaumburg girls team since 2002.
West Aurora Stampede: Bartlett's Alyssa Schneider wanted to test herself entering the West Aurora Stampede race to see if she could run with Geneva standout Kelly Whitley. On Saturday, the sophomore not only proved to the other 25 schools present that she's an elite runner, but she also proved to herself that she's a top runner in the state.
Schneider won the race in 17:25.
Geneva won the race with 73 points, placing four runners in the top 15. Whitley finished second in 17:36 despite falling twice in the woods on the slippery course.
Hoffman Estates finished third with 141 points and was led by Hannah Worman (third, 17:42) and Melissa Schmidt (fifth, 17:56).
Boys cross country
Sterling Invite: Schaumburg junior Pat Lesiewicz came home first with a time of 14:54 as the Saxons finished 11th.
Conant placed third, led by Juan Ramirez's 13th-place finish.
St. Charles East Invite: Palatine took home first-place honors (31 points), led by runner-up Alec Bollman (15:58) and third-place finisher Chano Bernardo (16:01). The Pirates' Tom Laskowske was sixth (16:13).