Girls volleyball: South Elgin tops Larkin in 3

Some South Elgin players had to adjust to new roles Tuesday night. While the process took awhile, everything eventually came together in a 25-17, 24-26, 25-16 girls volleyball win over Larkin in an Upstate Eight crossover in Elgin.

Rachel Priore had 15 kills, and freshman Hayley Fisher added 10 for the Storm (5-5 overall).

Samantha Wahl had 13 kills and Ella Riddle-Roland 8 for the Royals (2-8).

The Royals finished on a 7-2 run to win Game 2, then took an early lead in the third game, but couldn't sustain the momentum. The Storm scored 7 straight points to take a 14-8 lead and never looked back. The decisive run included a pair of aces by Julia Saldivar. Later, the Storm scored 5 more in a row to go up 19-10.

"This is our first game with our new lineup," said South Elgin coach Joni Plach. "I've got a lot of young girls in right now, a lot of inexperience. We just had the wrong server and couldn't really get back from that in the second game. That's why they play three of them."

The Storm was without its injured outside hitter Phoebe Duncan and had to shuffle its lineup, including moving Fisher from the right to the left side. Things didn't always go smoothly.

"Communication is a huge struggle for us," said Plach. "I have a young team. The freshmen are going to make their hitting errors, but we've got to work on communication."

"I have to get my serve-receive better, because I didn't really do much serve-receive when I was on the right side," Fisher said. "I had to be sure to get the right angle."

Larkin found some positives, but it was another inconsistent effort for the Royals.

"We've had struggles with consistency so far, so I'm trying to push them to play harder," said Larkin coach Henry Graack. "Just energy, energy, energy the entire time. I had them lifting weights before the game to get them moving, and I thought they came stronger in warm-ups. They looked ready to go and it was just kind of a roller coaster up and down."

Libero Sarah Murray came up with 18 digs for the Storm, while Priore added 15. Libby Vedrine had 4 kills, and setters Casie Swanson and Saldivar each had 15 assists.

For Larkin, Natalie Kofie had 24 assists and added 5 kills. April McGee had 14 digs.