Rosary blitzes St. Edward early, rolls to 2-game win
Whatever suspense existed for Rosary's home match against St. Edward Wednesday night disappeared by the time Amelia Wegman finished the Royals' opening serve.
Wegman's 14 consecutive service points staked Rosary to a 15-0 cushion. The Royals coasted from there for a 25-4, 25-16 victory.
"We weren't expecting to blow it out like that," Rosary's senior libero Haley Norris said. "It was a nice surprise I guess."
Rosary (8-2, 2-1) earned a quick sideout when Kate Stephanski - one of three sophomores in the Royals' starting lineup - put away Lindsay Juriga's set.
Another sophomore, Marissa Prochaska, recorded a kill for point two. The third sophomore, Briana Flagg, contributed three kills in the opening burst, including an off-balance, left-handed shot just after St. Edward coach Jaime Dovichi called timeout down 7-0.
Wegman's back-row kill made it 10-0 and her ace gave Rosary a 14-0 lead. The opening 15-point run finally ended when Rosary was called for a net violation.
"I figured if Amelia is not in the front roll killing the ball she's serving the ball at them," Rosary coach Lisa Kasper said. "We got some kids in who don't see a lot of playing time so that was nice."
The final point of Game 1 came on St. Edward's eighth hitting error.
The Green Wave (2-7, 0-2) were playing their first match since traveling to Effingham last weekend.
"Discouraging night," Dovichi said. "I have never had a night like that but I know you have those nights. Coming off a long travel, I don't know, I don't want to make excuses. It was just a bad match."
Rosary also roared out of the gates in Game 2 with a 7-0 lead behind Juriga's serving and four kills by Prochaska.
The Royals didn't make a hitting error until the score was 8-3 in Game 2 - they had 17 kills at a time - and finished with just 2 hitting errors in the match. They took their biggest lead at 19-6 on Wegman's swing.
The Green Wave closed the match outscoring the Royals 10-6. Stephanie Igielski had 2 kills that brought St. Edward as close as 23-16 before a quick dink by Juriga and Breann Maryanski's fourth block of the match gave Rosary the win.
"Rosary is very consistent and has a lot of strong hitters but we just kept giving them free balls," Dovichi said. "We weren't passing well, we couldn't get anything going on our side."
The Royals welcomed Emily Meyer and Abby Konovodoff back to the lineup for their first matches of the year. Both had been out with injuries.
Rosary, whose only two losses came against Huntley and Marian Central, is looking forward to the Wheaton Classic this weekend. They Royals open with Neuqua Valley and Wheaton North's JV on Friday and if they can win that pool might play No. 1 Hinsdale Central Saturday.
The tough tests will continue Monday when St. Francis comes to Rosary.
"It will be nice to see where we stack up with the best teams in the area," Kasper said.