Maroons derail Larkin in 2

A libero usually impacts a volleyball match with their defense.

Elgin's Lindsey Hedl found other ways to make a difference Thursday.

A back-row kill and three consecutive aces to end the first game helped the Maroons to a 25-17, 25-16 road victory against crosstown rival Larkin in a nonconference match.

"We've jelled a lot better this year," Hedl said. "We know how to communicate. We all get along. We practiced hard before the season."

The Maroons (1-0) led an error-filled Game 1 by a point, 17-16, after a tip kill from Abbey Houde. Then Hedl slammed a back-row kill that seemed to wake up Elgin. Hedl, a senior, went back to the service line with a 20-17 lead. After a couple of Larkin errors, Hedl served back-to-back-to-back aces to give the Maroons the opening game victory.

Hedl finished with 5 aces and 2 kills.

"We're working on her jump serve right now," Maroons coach Keith Foster said. "She such a strong server deep in the court, we kind of focused on that a little bit."

In the opening game, the teams struggled early, giving each other free points. Only two of the first 30 points came on kills and each team had 5 service errors in Game 1.

"The mistakes early on were really all the result of being the first match," Foster said. "We've got a lot of good practice in, but in the first match the nerves are always high. But they really pulled through."

The Royals (0-2) jumped out to a 4-2 lead in the Game 2 after two aces from Amanda Lye, who also led the Royals with 2 kills. But the Maroons scored the next 5 points to take a 7-4 lead and eventually extended that lead to 11 on three occasions, the last coming at 24-13. The Royals were able to survive three match points before Danielle Lawry's third kill ended the match.

"Our serve receive is what killed us," Larkin coach Gail Johnson said. "They made it really difficult on us. We're going to work really hard on that the next week so we can set up our hitters."

Houde led Elgin with 5 kills and 7 assists.