Girls volleyball: IC Catholic's balanced attack beats St. Francis
Lucy Russ makes an impact that goes well beyond a basic, formulaic approach for a general setter.
Visibly watching Russ, the IC Catholic senior, point-after-point helps make exceedingly clear she's certainly an offensive threat that cannot be ignored. It's an area she evolved to compliment the Class 2A state runner-ups from last season.
“She's just a gamer,” IC Catholic coach Nancy Kerrigan said about Russ following the Knights' 25-18, 19-25, 25-19 victory over St. Francis on Thursday. “She has an innate feeling for the floor and she knows when to feed hitters and when to take over herself. She's definitely a gamer.”
While senior outside hitter and Penn State commit Ava Falduto commands the lion's share of defensive attention with over 200 kills and averaging 4.4 kills per set, Russ finds her spots to put some down herself.
Russ finished with five kills and three aces in the three-set win. Entering Thursday, Russ had 117 kills and averages 2.2 kills per set.
“Last year, I wasn't really an offensive setter,” Russ said. “I trained myself a lot this summer and this season. I [worked on] changing my shots up and I became a more offensive setter and I taught myself more tricks. It's getting us points, so I think it's good I'm an offensive setter.
“Coach talked to me a lot this season like 'we can't have Ava hit every ball. You need to become a more offensive setter and you can do it', so she pushed me to become a better setter.”
In set one, St. Francis (21-8, 5-2) pushed IC Catholic (25-3, 6-1) to within 21-18, but three Spartan attack errors and a kill from Delilah Hyland was all they needed to put it away 25-18.
The Spartans then rebounded with a steady effort in set two. Up 20-19, St. Francis rode a 5-0 streak led by three Addy Horner kills, a kill from Anna Paquette and an attack error in the sequence to force a third set.
In set three, with both teams trading marginal leads throughout the latter part of the match, IC was ultimately able to wrestle away control. IC built a slim 21-19 lead and kept up the offensive flow with kills from Emily Carling, Falduto, a Spartans attack error and final definitive swing from Falduto again to maintain their 10-game winning streak.
Falduto finished with 15 kills to pace IC Catholic.
“Honestly, we don't think about the streaks or the wins stringing them together. What we've been focused on is 'where do we want to be at this point in the season?' Going into the last part of the regular season, we want to be stretching to our best volleyball so we know when we get into the playoffs, we're battle ready,” Kerrigan said.
St. Francis was paced by Horner's 14 kills, two aces, nine assists and four digs, while Paquette followed with 13 kills, one ace, two assists and 10 digs. Shay McMillen had four kills, while Catherine D'Orazio led all with 24 digs.
“[Paquette] is a four-year starter for us and she, being a little undersized as an outside, sees the floor very well and she's uber athletic,” St. Francis coach Lisa Ston said. “She can jump out of the gym, so she has worked really hard. She's a libero in club. She has really worked on her shots and being able to execute them when she needs to.
“[Horner] is very talented also. As a junior, I think it's a lot of pressure for her to be the go-to player in a lot of situations for us. She does a nice job executing. She does not really get frazzled in-game. You just see her amping up.”