Batavia's comeback kids

Batavia earned another shot at archrival Geneva, but the Bulldogs first had to put in a long, hard night of volleyball at the Class 4A Addison Trail regional on Thursday.

The No. 7 Bulldogs (21-14-1) let a 20-13 lead slip away in Game 1 against No. 10 Wheaton Warrenville South but regrouped to outlast the Tigers 23-25, 25-22, 26-24.

With the victory, Batavia advances to Saturday's 1 p.m. regional title match against second-seeded Geneva, which swept host Addison Trail in the last of three matches played on Thursday at Addison Trail.

"What a big win for our girls. We beat a team in the DVC," said Batavia coach Lori Trippi-Payne. "We let that lead get away in the first game, but give Wheaton Warrenville South credit. They served real aggressively and they blocked solid."

WW South came out sloppy and quickly trailed 10-2 following a kill by the Bulldogs Katie Rueffer. The Tigers did claw back to within 13-9 following a winner by Jacky Rodriguez, but then got behind 20-13.

An 8-0 run by the Tigers (18-18) powered them to a 25-23 victory in the opener, but Batavia was more consistent the rest of the night led by junior outside Caitlin Piechota, who slammed down a career-equalling best 16 kills in the match.

"We let the first one slip away and we just knew we needed to calm down," Piechota said. "We came back with more intensity. We just said 'forget about it and come out strong the next two games.' "

Batavia turned the tables on the Tigers in Game 2, falling behind 10-5 and then 16-11 only to battle back and prevail 25-22 to set up a decisive third game. Defense played a big role as libero Stephanie Kinane recorded a career-high 19 digs and Kelsey VandenBorn added 6 block kills for Batavia.

Game 3 was tight throughout but the Bulldogs did grab a quick 6-1 lead before WW South managed to tie the match at 21, 22, 23 and 24 before Batavia pulled out the long match after a winning dig made it 25-24 and then a Tigers' hitting error ended the tilt.

"We just ran out of gas both in Game 2 and Game 3," Tigers coach Bill Schreier said. "You wish sometimes you could just get off to a fast start, but that's volleyball. Number 10 (Piechota) had a great game for them."

Geneva d. Addison Trail: It was a win, a sweep no less, but Geneva knows it did not play its best volleyball Thursday night.

Maybe it was the late start, or maybe it was the fact that the No. 2 Vikings may have been expecting an easy win over a 15th-seeded Addison Trail squad that had to outlast No. 18 Rolling Meadows in three games earlier in the night. Maybe it was a little of each.

Either way, Geneva missed five serves early and struggled to put away the 17-19 Blazers before eventually prevailing 25-17, 25-21 to advance to the Class 3A regional round where it will attempt to defeat Batavia for a third straight time this season.

"We just came out very flat," Vikings coach KC Johnsen said after his squad improved to 34-2 on the year. "Give Addison credit. They came out scrappy and with more intensity than we did."

With Geneva misfiring on a number of serves early, the match was tied 7 times before the Vikings broke from an 8-8 draw to take a 16-10 lead following a tip winner by Katie Sommer and a powerful spike by Lauren Wicinski, who recorded a match-high 12 kills on the night. Kelsey Augustine, who finished the night with 10 kills, slammed home a pair of points late in the opener as the Vikings took Game 1 25-17.

The Blazers, who were paced by strong serving from Becca Hoder and some big blocks up front from Giana Casciola and Katie Keller, kept fighting in Game 2 despite facing deficits of 10-4 and 16-8. When Casciola followed a Wicinski kill with one for AT, the Blazers found themselves within 22-18.

But Augustine and Wicinski powered home the final two points of the night as Geneva prevailed 25-21 to advance.

"It's always a good game when we play Batavia," Johnsen said. "I don't think we'll be flat against Batavia."

Augustine said it was tough to hang around watching the Bulldogs' three-game win over Wheaton Warrenville South push their match more than an hour past its scheduled time.

"We got here ready to play and they still hadn't started the third game yet," she said. "It was hard to get in game mode and we came out weaker than we should have."

But like her coach, she doesn't expect that to the case on Saturday.

"It's going to be a good one since they're our rivals," she said. "It's going to be exciting."