Cary-Grove completes perfect conference season
The smiles were a little bigger and the cheers a little louder following Cary-Grove's 26-24, 25-16 victory at Dundee-Crown Thursday night.
The Trojans (28-4, 10-0) completed a perfect season in the Fox Valley Conference Valley Division, and they were understandably proud of it.
"It's a big thing for us," senior libero Delaney Bayer said. "We've been working so hard since the beginning of the season. A lot of us have been working hard since our freshman year. It's exciting to know we have more ahead of us. This is just the first step."
Dundee-Crown (16-7, 4-5) pushed the Trojans in the opening set, rallying from a 22-18 deficit to tie the score at 24.
Cary-Grove hung on and then went on to win in 2 sets, which it did in every conference match except for a 3-set win over Crystal Lake South in the teams' first meeting.
"It's always rare in our conference to be able to go undefeated," Trojans coach Patty Langanis said. "It was a goal from the beginning of the year and tonight we were able to finalize it. We wanted to really celebrate and enjoy the moment along the way."
Playing without right side Rachel Rosch who turned her ankle in Tuesday's match, the Trojans started slow in a tight first set with 13 ties and 5 lead changes.
The Chargers pushed to their biggest lead at 12-9 helped by back-to-back kills from Ashley Raby and Paige Gieseke. The Trojans answered with the next 4 points, the final coming on Sarah Graham's kill, to go back in front.
The Trojans reached their first set point at 24-23 when Erin Olson set Madison Katchen, but the Chargers came right back with Gina Pagano's kill.
Cary-Grove finally put the Trojans away on Allie Splitt's kill in the middle, then a miscommunication by the Chargers on a routine ball they couldn't get back over the net - a rare mistake in an otherwise well-played set.
"They played really smart volleyball," Langanis said of the Chargers. "They didn't make a lot of mistakes and were forcing us out of system a lot. We didn't get big swings on the ball like we usually can and we were having a hard time getting any momentum."
That changed in the second set. Tied at 5, the Trojans scored 5 straight with Kate Michie serving, and they led comfortably the rest of the match.
Olson, Splitt, Graham and Allie Vasquez combined for 30 kills to supply most of the Cary-Grove offense while the Chargers countered with Pagano's 5 kills, 4 from Bre Novak and Frankie Cavallaro, and 3 each for Emma Brant, Gieseke and Raby.
"We're pleased," Chargers coach Christine Hopkins-Muehl said. "We've been having some ups and downs in the middle of the season. We're pleased we pushed them hard in the first game and played a lot better than we did the last time we played them. We blocked better, we hit really well, there's just some defensive issues here and there."
Cavallaro added 12 assists for the Chargers. Ali Buckley had 6 assists and 2 aces, and Zoe Sitarz finished with 7 digs.