Messa lets leadership show as St. Francis defeats Wheaton North
Last season senior Jon Messa was the new varsity guy on the St. Francis boys volleyball team - the lone non-senior in the starting rotation for a 33-6 team that reached the sectional semifinals.
Now the libero is the Spartans' only varsity returnee and one of only two seniors.
"Last year I was the youngest guy, but they did a really good job of including me. This year it's kind of my responsibility to make sure everyone's included and everyone's working together so it's a cool experience," Messa said.
The Spartans already showed some signs of maturity in Monday's season opener. They outlasted crosstown rival and host Wheaton North 26-24, 25-21.
St. Francis rallied from trailing 24-22 in the first game and then, after taking a 5-0 lead in the second game, held on after the Falcons closed to 21-20 and 22-21.
"That's the thing. They never gave up (in the first game). That's what I'm happy about," St. Francis coach Mike Lynch said. "I could see things started to improve. The things we were running, those things started happening as they started getting more comfortable with it."
Junior Matt Baggio and Messa led St. Francis. Seniors Sam Bedrossian and Ethan Peterson led the Falcons.
Like St. Francis, the Falcons are pretty much starting over. Bedrossian is the lone returning starter from last year's 19-14 team that lost in the regional semifinals. The Falcons also were minus one possible starter.
"The matches during the first week of the season are the growing matches. Sometimes this is the reality shock where you realize tangible evidence that we've got to work on this, this and this in practice," Wheaton North coach John Noe said.
Both teams experienced typical first-match struggles, magnified by a low ceiling that made several serve receives and passes an adventure. St. Francis scored the final two points of the first game on its first solo blocks by Steve Burns and Nick Roehl after earlier having three net violations.
"We were nervous during warmups, the national anthem. Once the game started, we kind of shook it off and performed well," St. Francis junior Conor Reinke said.
After a service error on the Falcons' first game point, Reinke served three straight points. An attack error tied the game at 24. Roehl's block came soon after Reinke's diving dig kept the ball alive.
"I rolled over and then saw my good friend Nick come up with that big block to win it so that was fun," Reinke said.
After a dump kill by setter Jack McGuire, Baggio served the Spartans to a 5-0 lead. Baggio later served the final two points of the match both off attack errors.
The Falcons came within one point twice but gave the serves back with an error and for being out of rotation - on offense. The Spartans received four more points for the Falcons being out of rotation for serve receive.
"I told them the biggest thing I was disappointed about was those out of rotation calls because they were guys that were seniors. Those really caught me off guard and surprised me," Noe said.
The Spartans also received a second-game lift with 3 kills each by Burns and junior Jack O'Connell, who did not play in the first game. Junior Timmy Pisarski and sophomore McGuire have been converted into setters.
"I looked out there one time and we had four juniors and two sophomores on the court," Lynch said. "Everyone stepped up and played their role today, which is really good to see. You're expecting that, but you never know, first-game jitters."
No one was more proud of the effort than Messa.
"I don't think we really played nervous and I think we did a really good job," Messa said. "Definitely the guys have been working really hard in the gym. I'm just trying to be that senior leader and get them to work as hard as last year. I have the same expectations for this team as I did last year."