Hersey volleyball taking care of business

Hersey girls volleyball coach Nancy Lill warned her players they could not overlook visiting Rolling Meadows on Thursday night.

Because the Huskies did not, they are still looking over everyone else in the Mid-Suburban League East Division.

The four-time defending champion Huskies posted a 25-13, 25-20 victory over the Mustangs to maintain sole possession of first place.

Hersey (16-5, 6-1) leads Prospect (5-2) and Elk Grove (5-2) by 1 match.

"We just realize every conference match is important," said Huskies senior outside hitter Lauren Dembkowski, who put down a match-high 10 kills. "We want to win them all. I thought Rolling Meadows played much better than the first time we played them (25-8, 25-16). I give them credit."

Credit Dembkowski with helping the Huskies break away from the Mustangs (9-11, 3-4) in Game 1.

With the score tied at 5-5, a hitting error by Meadows made it 6-5 when Dembkowski stepped to the service line.

She served for the next 8 points, including an ace, plus 2 kills by Ann Carroll and another from Katie Lill for a 14-6 lead the Huskies would never relinquish.

Game 2 was tied at 12-12 when the Huskies' Shelly Mueller served for 5 straight points. The senior setter finished with 25 assists from 41 sets and also had 8 digs.

"Shelly did a great job distributing ball," Nancy Lill said. "Everyone knows but Lauren (Dembkowski). But we have others who can hit, too. Katie (Lill) had a big match and Ann Carroll has had a couple of strong back-to-back matches. Everyone is contributing."

McKenzie Forbes (3 kills), Grace Nowack (2) and Mueller (1) also chipped in on the attack. Defensively, freshman Jenni Mueller collected 8 digs and senior Annie Schey added 6.

Meadows was led on attack by Dana Demmert (5 kills), Jenna Milas (5), Jackie Carbery (4) and Katie Stensland (4).

"Janet Opel's (Rolling Meadows coach) teams always play strong defense," Nancy Lill said. "They jump well and they are well-coached. They were much better than the first time we played."

Demmert and Lindsey Berg each had 10 digs for the Mustangs.

"Our defense is improving," Demmert said. "But we're still not playing to our full potential.

"And we still have to get over the mental block we have against Hersey. For some reason, we don't come in with the confidence we should have. It's getting better, but still not there."

Opels echoed Demmert's comments.

"We play extremely well at the Harlem tournament (last weekend) where we played teams as competitive as Hersey," Opels said. "We just have such a mental block against these guys (Hersey). And I can't figure out why.

"Our serve receive broke down again. And the bottom line is that when you don't pass, you can't run your offense."