Rolling Meadows bands together, tops Elk Grove

A few weeks ago, a sign at a Rolling Meadows girls volleyball match read "Three Megans are better than one."

When it came to attacking, it was hard to tell which Megan (or Meghan) was better on Thursday night.

Longtime best friends Megan King, Megan Mich and Meghan Slowik were all on the floor when Mich served seven straight points to give Meadows a 21-25, 25-14, 25-10 Mid-Suburban East victory over visiting Elk Grove.

During Mich's match-ending service run, Megan King had two of her 4 kills displaying her usual craftiness with the dump shots.

King also had one of her 3 aces during the final rally of the night.

King, Mich and Slowik each finished with 4 kills in the match.

Slowik, an outside hitter, finished with 3 aces, including two bigs one in the middle of the second set which put the Mustangs ahead 20-9.

"I love playing on the court with my two best friends," said the 5-foot-7 Slowik, who met the 5-8 Mich and 5-6 King (setters) in the fifth grade playing for the Rolling Meadows feeder girls basketball team.

Mich and King have been classmates since kindergarten (Westgate and then South Middle School).

Set 1 belonged to Elk Grove (1-10, 0-3) which took a 23-16 lead when junior Kylie Ostling put down a kill.

A back-to-back kill and block by Jenny Srnak followed by Gabrielle Paige's block got Meadows (11-4-1, 2-1) to within 24-20 before Isabel Michniak closed out the set with a kill.

"Carly Crothers (12 digs in the match) played well in the first set," said Grenadiers coach Stephanie Kezios. "And our freshman right side hitter Rachel Kandefer has been playing well for us this season."

Michniak and Ostling each finished with 3 kills apiece while Alex Masnica and Mary Cronin shared setting duties with 5 assists apiece.

"We came out with a lot of energy so I was excited about that," Kezios said. "Our goal was to be aggressive. Offensively we wanted to put the ball away and I thought we did that.

"In the second and third sets, we played a little scared and I will give a lot of credit to Rolling Meadows. They just turned it on. They are very strong offensively."

Leading that offense was Maddie Sellergren (10 kills) and Hannah Mickey (9 kills), who also had 3 blocks.

Mich had 18 assists and King 13.

"After the first set, our coach (Joe DiSilvio) just told us to be confident in what we were doing and keep the speed of the game at a high level," Mich said.

"We wanted to take a positive attitude into the second set," Slowik added "And we wanted to build off each other to make the plays."

The Mustangs made a big play right away as Paige put down a kill.

King served six straight points, including an ace for a 6-0 lead. Mich and Slowik each had kills during the rally.

"The main thing is that he (DiSilvio) told us not to get down because we could still win the match," Slowik said.

The Mustangs never wavered in their enthusiasm and finally wrapped up the set when Mich put down a kill off a King set.

King's quick set to Mickey got things rolling for Meadows in Set 3.

This time, the Mustangs opened with a 5-0 lead behind the serve of King, who was 25-of-25 in the match.

An ace by Mickey gave Meadows gave Meadows an 11-4 advantage and the Mustangs never left the Grens closer than 4.

"Hats off to Elk Grove in that first set," DiSilvio said. "They really wanted that game. They served well and we made a lot of hitting errors.

"We had to settle down in the next two sets to get ball control back. We needed to get opportunities to put the ball down."