Girls volleyball: Huntley holds on, clinches share of FVC crown
Nobody said winning its first Fox Valley Conference championship would come easy for Huntley's girls volleyball team. Crystal Lake South made sure of that.
The Gators put up quite a fight Tuesday night in Huntley, especially in an epic second set. The Red Raiders regrouped and finally prevailed, 25-20, 33-35, 25-16 to clinch a share of the conference crown.
"That's awesome for us," Huntley star Ally Dion said. "We have to beat PR (Prairie Ridge) to win it alone. We don't want to share."
Huntley (24-6, 13-2) can indeed win the title outright by beating Prairie Ridge at home Thursday night.
Crystal Lake South (10-15, 8-7) almost denied the Red Raiders that chance. The Gators led for nearly the entire first set, including 7-1 and 14-6. They were still up 20-17 only to watch Huntley score the final 8 points.
Dion started the run with a kill, then stepped to the service line for 7 straight points including a pair of aces. Julia Johnson capped the comeback with a block. Johnson also had a long service run with a couple aces herself bringing Huntley from 15-9 down to within 15-14.
As good as that finish was, it got even better in a second set that saw one long rally after another with high-level play on both sides of the net. Often it was the Gators coming up with a dig of what looked to be a sure Huntley winner.
"You have to give South credit," Huntley coach Karen Naymola said. "They played phenomenal defense, they played out of their minds."
The teams battled through 24 ties and 6 lead changes in the second set. Huntley had a pair of match points at 27-26 and 28-27 only to see the Gators erase them on a kill by Kleja Cerniauskaite and a Huntley service error.
The Red Raiders were just as clutch, fending off seven game points before Cerniauskaite's block sent the match to a deciding third set.
"They kept getting to game point, we had to fight back," Dion said. "Eventually they played better in that set and put the balls down when they needed to. They deserved that second set."
Huntley only trailed once in the third set, 6-5, and followed with a 12-4 surge to force a Fontana timeout with the Red Raiders up 17-10. The Gators didn't have another comeback in them, and Dion capped the long night with a thunderous kill on match point.
"Game 3 we really stepped up," Naymola said. "We were more consistent. We knew what was on the line and what was at stake.
"This was a big game for us and I think there was pressure on us and we were playing tense and not our usual relaxed selves. Great, great fan support, that was the largest crowd we've seen all year, and it got to us a little bit."
Not much got to Dion, who finished with 25 digs, 23 kills and 3 aces. She had help from teammates including Sarah Zayas (22 digs), Taylor Jakubowski (39 assists) and Caitlin Thorelius (8 kills).
The Gators were led by Jordan Proszenyak (16 digs, 11 kills), Emiily Slimko (16 assists), Aurora Nero (17 digs, 3 blocks, 13 kills) and Cerniauskaite (5 kills, 6 blocks).
"Those are situations you kind of train for and they don't always happen and that just happened about 10 times," Gators coach Jorie Fontana said of the tense points in the second set.
"It's cool. Kind of challenges us. Especially going into the postseason it shows how tough your team is. We've kind of had an up-and-down season and mental toughness is something we need to improve on. Seeing them come out and take that second set is definitely a plus for us and shows some growth and improvement since the last time we played them."