Boys volleyball: Vernon Hills rebounds, takes third in own tourney

Vernon Hills takes third: At its own Cougar Classic, Vernon Hills took third place by sweeping Glenbrook South 25-23, 25-17.

To open the tournament on Friday night, Vernon Hills lost to Glenbrook South in three sets.

New Trier then defeated Vernon Hills in the semifinals, 25-20, 27-25 and is now 15-18 on the season.

"Last night was a slog, and we couldn't often get out of our own way," Vernon Hills coach Chris Curry said of his team's loss to Glenbrook South on Friday. "This morning was much better. When we were down 17-18 in set one versus New Trier in the semifinal, we had a few clean looks, took hard swings, and just missed. Then we missed 3 out of 4 serves trying to be too careful and lost contact. But the kids played some of our best volleyball of the year in the second set. We were down 19-20 when we put a few errors back to back, but then battled back from 21-24 to knot it up at 24 and 25.

Joey Reyes came back from injury and gave us a lift offensively today (16/20, 11 kills and 4 blocks). And Ryan Pristas was a great spark plug when we were down early in the last match. His energy and communication turned that around for us."

Derrick Jones led the Vernon Hills offense.

He had 40 kills, and also finished with 8 blocks and 16 digs. Setter Jonathan Wallach had 74 assists.

Libero Sammy Adkisson (Jr. libero) finished with 51 digs.