Cary-Grove to play for state title — again
NORMAL — Cary-Grove girls volleyball coach Patty Langanis said before the Class 4A Final Four began that the team that wins the state tournament will be the team that shows the most guts.
The Trojans have ‘em, and they showed ‘em at Redbird Arena Friday.
Cary-Grove demonstrated a phenomenal amount of intestinal fortitude in a hotly contested semifinal by outlasting Marist 35-33, 25-19 to advance to today’s state championship match against Benet (38-3), which defeated St. Charles East 25-20, 22-25, 25-19.
The victory advances Cary-Grove (37-4) to the state title match for the third consecutive season. The Trojans will attempt to win their second state title in three years at approximately 9 p.m.
“It was a tough game,” said Langanis, whose team improved to 37-4. “Things weren’t coming easy for us throughout the match. The way these guys persevered in this game — to fight to make sure they were in the state championship — I’m really proud of the entire team.”
Marist (34-7) led the first game 14-9 until the Trojans surged for a 7-2 run to tie it, paced by 2 aces from Sheila Wilhelmi. The marathon game produced 18 ties and 13 lead changes overall.
The Trojans took a 25-24 lead on one of senior Melanie Jereb’s 11 kills, but the RedHawks fired back with a spike from Kirsten Ivkovic. From that point forward it was a test of wills.
The lead seesawed. Marist staved off 5 game points. Cary-Grove saved 4 game points of its own. Twice Marist had big swings to put the first game away, but Wilhelmi and Mallory Wliczynski each came up with block kills to keep the Trojans alive. Wilczynski finished with 6 blocks and 2 kills.
“I’ve been talking about them for a couple of weeks,” Langanis said of her middles. “If Sheila and Mallory can contribute blocking and offense, we’re going to be an incredibly tough team to stop. They came with some big kills at some big moments and some big kills right when we needed them. Marist has two dynamic outside hitters and when we were getting touches on them it really helped us stay alive in the match.”
Wilhelmi’s block tied the game 33-33. Jereb then smartly pushed a ball behind the Marist defense for a 1-point lead.
Senior Ashley Rosch notched Game 1 for the Trojans when her ace found the floor, allowing everyone clad in blue to exhale. Rosch had 2 aces and 10 kills.
“This was probably the most competitive game ever,” said Rosch, who next year will play college volleyball on the same court for Illinois State. “I’ve never been in a game that went that high. It was a lot of fun.”
Marist surged to a 13-9 lead in Game 2 on a crushed ball by Mallory Salis, who led all scorers with 15 kills.
Back came Cary-Grove. The Trojans scored 8 of the next 11 points to regain the lead. Rosch’s un-diggable spike kill put the Trojans ahead 17-16. They scored the next 2 points on a Marist hitting error and Rosch’s second ace.
“You’ve got to give credit where credit is due,” Marist coach Natalie Holder said. “They made very few errors and we made a lot of errors, a lot of unforced errors. But the match doesn’t come down to unforced errors. We just did not control our side of the net the way we usually do, and you can’t do that against a team the caliber of Cary-Grove.”
After a Marist timeout, Cary-Grove put the match away, powered by 2 late kills from junior right side Alex Lerner, whose spikes earned the Trojans their 21st and 23rd points.
“I think we tried to go into this game with the mindset that we were going to try to mix up the offense and give every hitter an equal opportunity,” said C-G setter Jess Bartczyszyn, who finished with 28 assists. “(Lerner) can really put the ball away at key moments.”
A powerful Jereb swing resulted in a 24-19 Cary-Grove lead, and Rosch terminated match point with a spike off the Marist defense.
Next up is Benet, an unfamiliar, talented foe.
“We’ve never played Benet in our history so this will be a really fun matchup,” Langanis said. “The coaches will be doing a lot of work with film, trying to find out where their weaknesses are. There doesn’t look like there’s a lot.”