Boys volleyball: Stevenson finishes what it started at Lake County tournament
Stevenson was the team to beat from day one of the Lake County boys volleyball tournament, and the Patriots did not let their fans down Saturday afternoon in the final day of the 12-team tourney at Grant.
The Patriots (17-2) opened the day with a 25-13, 25-17 victory over Grayslake North in the quarterfinals before toppling Carmel Catholic (9-4) 25-14, 25-11 in the semifinals to set up a rematch from Thursday against the host Bulldogs (9-6) in the championship game.
Grant had no answers to Stevenson's superior attacking and defense as the Patriots cruised to the team title 25-13, 25-16 behind a team-high 9 kills by Daniel Nuudel.
The Patriots also got 6 kills from Christian Headley and 4 kills from Sam Nuudel in the finals while Ethan Yang led Grant with 6 kills.
"Today I was just super happy that whoever I set the ball to they put the ball down, and I'm just grateful to be a setter that is a part of this team because any hitter I have is a great hitter so that makes my job easy out there," said Daniel Nuudel. "Everyone right now is really focused in and having those losses early on this season was able to really teach us a lesson that we have to focus on every single game and then we're able to go on a roll after that."
Stevenson coach Eric Goolish had nothing but praise as his team is now on a 6-game winning streak.
"I'm very happy how we played, particularly today," said Goolish. "There are a lot of distractions in tournaments, and they did a good job today showing up ready to play."
Grant coach Marty Grum was also pleased with his squad's performance in the tourney.
"They (Stevenson) brought it today, I think we did our very best and played very well, but they were able to keep that ball up," said Grum. "We are very proud of that second place in this tournament, and it was really nice we were able to come back and play them again for the championship."
The third-place match was definitely a wild one as Grayslake Central (7-7) lost the first set to the Corsairs 25-17 before coming back with a 25-21 win in the second set.
But a spike by Carmel's Tommy Sulfridge clinched an exciting 25-23 victory as the Corsairs took home the third-place plaque. Jake Beshel led the Rams with 8 kills against Carmel.
"It was a dogfight, and we don't have to be pretty all the time- winning ugly is still winning," said Carmel coach Kevin Nylen. "They had to dig deep, they're tired, and they played a lot of volleyball the last few days."
After losing to Grant in the quarterfinals, Mundelein (10-5) bounced back as the Mustangs beat Deerfield 25-19, 25-20 for fifth place. Mundelein's Matt Kawa had 8 kills against the Warriors while teammate Samay Prajapati had 5 kills.
Grayslake North (8-6) went 1-2 on the day as the Knights beat Waukegan in two sets to take seventh place. Grayslake North's Nathan Atwell had 8 kills against Waukegan while teammate Kyle Hironimus had 5 kills.