Redwings impress Lemont, win own tournament

If you want an opinion on just how good Benet is, Lemont girls volleyball coach Chris Zogata is a good place to start.

Her Indians have only lost twice this season after a 25-18, 23-25, 25-16 defeat to the No. 1 Redwings in Saturday's Benet Invitational championship. Lemont's other loss was a three-gamer to Mother McAuley, a team Benet could play in the Class 4A semifinals.

McAuley may be the hottest team in Illinois right now, after taking third at the Nike Challenge.

"Honestly, I think Benet is the better team," Zogata said. "They're bigger, a little bit faster and they hit the ball a little bit harder. McAuley is very good and very scrappy. It would be a very interesting match. I'd love to see it."

Benet (26-0) kept its unbeaten streak alive and beat Lemont in three games for the second straight year in its tournament championship. The Indians are only the fourth team to take the Redwings to three games this season.

"It was a very close match last year, just like this one," said Benet senior Natalie Patzin, who had a match-high 16 kills. "We wanted to prove to them that this is our tournament."

Benet started slow in both of the first two games. The Redwings trailed 14-12 in Game 1 before an Ariana Mankus kill set off a run of five straight points to turn the momentum for good. Lemont (21-2) led 14-11 in Game 2 on a Jeanna Litoborski kill, but Benet rallied to tie it at 20-20 on a Patzin kill. Three ties later, Courtney Keefe threw down a kill for Lemont and a long Benet hit gave the Indians the game.

"They're 53rd in the nation for a reason," said Benet coach Brad Baker, whose own team is ranked No. 3 according to PrepVolleyball.com. "That's a quality team we played."

The Redwings left nothing to chance in Game 3. A Val Mattaliano kill and Paige Vargas ace started things off, and a pair of Patzin kills gave the Redwings an early 9-4 lead. Benet never trailed in the final game, and finished things off with the last four points of the game. Two Mankus kills, a Jessica Jendryk tip kill and a Gina Finke ace wrapped things up.

"That third game, we weren't taking anything for granted," Patzin said. "We knew we had to get down to business."

"They're really good," Zogata said of Benet, "and I told our girls we really have to jump out ahead of them. I was afraid if they got too far ahead like they did in that third game that we couldn't recover."

Mankus had 15 kills, Jendryk 11 and Brianne Hucek 42 assists for Benet. Litoborski had 10 kills, Keefe 9 and Aubrey Sniegowski 6 for Lemont.

"I really didn't think we had our 'A' game all day today," Baker said. "We played well and obviously won the tournament, but I still think there's another level that we're going to be at in the next couple weeks."

Benet defeated Hinsdale Central 25-13, 25-12 in the semifinals, the Redwings' third win over the Red Devils this season. Lemont outlasted York 25-22, 16-25, 25-20 in the other semifinal. Hinsdale Central (19-7), which lost to York (24-6) in conference earlier this season, beat its West Suburban Silver rival 25-21, 21-25, 28-26 for third place. Lindsay Homme had 11 kills and 7 blocks, Mary Crofton 6 kills and Allison Davis 4 kills and 4 blocks in the match for Hinsdale Central.