St. Henry volleyball coach Maureen Kaiser wants balance on the team from her hitters.
On Tuesday, she got plenty of it as the Crusaders dispatched Ryle, 3-0 (25-16, 25-13, 25-7) in the 9th Region volleyball tournament semifinals, punching their ticket to Thursday’s championship game.
The Crusaders (31-8) racked up 38 kills on their way to victory with just seven hitting errors. It started with Elizabeth Tabeling digging up balls, Macy Lentz dishing out assists and a variety of hitters putting the ball away.
“That’s what we’re trying to do is kind of spread the offense around and have their blockers guess a little bit more,” Kaiser said. “That all comes with the pass. If you don’t pass, that offense isn’t going to flow the way it does. We were kind of shaky at first, passing really high mid-court and unable to get our middles involved. As the game progressed we were able to develop a rhythm and take them out of their offense.”
After a first set that was tight at 15-12, St. Henry pretty much took over from there. They rattled off a 10-4 run to close the first set, leading into a 16-7 start into the second set.
The third set? A runaway and St. Henry’s most complete set of the tournament so far, racking up 16 kills to go with four blocks. Anna Guard had five kills and four blocks in the set.
“After that first set, I think we just got everything out of us that we needed to with any mistakes and then we really started playing as a team,” Guard said. “It got exciting to realize how much farther we could go in this tournament, so we started picking it up and we started having a lot more fun which I think kind of flipped the switch in the game.”
When Guard wasn’t dominating at the net it was Alivia Skidmore putting away kills with a fury, the ball coming off at a different pace than anyone else on the floor Tuesday night. Or it was Corrine Blackburn or sophomore Emily Helmers putting balls away.
“Just went into the game with a positive attitude and mindset,” Helmers said. “I didn’t underestimate Ryle, but I went into it with a good attitude and just creating a good environment for my team around me and I know my seniors have my back.”
St. Henry has found its rhythm since a Sept. 22 loss to Notre Dame, winning eight in a row from that game. Thursday’s opponent happens to be the Pandas, a matchup that will have a state championship feel to it with two top five teams in the state, who also happen to have the last two state titles, St. Henry in 2021, Notre Dame in 2022.
“We ran out of steam last time and we also didn’t have Corrine Blackburn. Not saying she’s going to score a lot of points, but she’s definitely a threat at the net,” Kaiser said. “I feel like we’ve grown as a team the past couple of weeks and each game we’ve grown and got better. The loss put things in perspective. We’ve traveled a ton this year. Went to a Nike tournament, saw a lot of teams, took some tough losses in that. Went to LIT and had some shaky times with Alivia out for two weeks and just got Corinne a little after the Notre Dame game. We’ve definitely grown as a team.”
Get to Cooper High School early Thursday night with a match time of 6:30 p.m., the gym expected to hit numbers like they did in the last matchup at Boone County.
“They deserve it. We’ve got nothing to lose. You either play to go or play to stay,” Kaiser said.
As for Ryle, a strong season comes to a close at 24-13, graduating five seniors that reigned supremacy in the 33rd District by winning it all four years they were in high school and claiming the program’s first ever victory over Notre Dame in 2021. They also reached two region championship games in 2020 and ’22.
“That’s a special group, Alexis (Woolf) is a five-year varsity starter, Kiana (Dinn) is a four-year starter, Abby (Lester) is a three-year starter. Several of them have been a part of this for a long time,” Raiders coach Tasha Lovins said. “They’ve been to regional finals, beat Notre Dame for the first time in school history. It’s a great group of seniors.”
Two of their five seniors will go on to play Division I volleyball, Kiana Dinn headed to the University of Pittsburgh while Alexis Woolf will take her talents in-state to Eastern Kentucky University. The cupboard isn’t bare however, as they’ll return several rotational players for a team still trying to break through in the region tournament against powerhouses St. Henry and Notre Dame.
“We have a great group of underclassmen and a group that can’t be overlooked,” Lovins said. “Felt like the first set we were ready to go tonight, even though we didn’t take it we had a fight in us. The second and third set that flame went out, trying to find it back. At times we tried to overcompensate for things and got away from what we needed to do.”