Mendon Makes Good on Great Expectation
By
Paul Costanzo
Special for MHSAA.com
November 17, 2018
BATTLE CREEK – It took the Mendon volleyball team only one tournament to realize how good it was this season, and the Hornets certainly weren’t shy about making big proclamations.
“We started really early,” senior outside hitter Hayley Kramer said. “Our first tournament we were like, ‘We’re going to be state champions.’”
Mendon made good on that claim Saturday, sweeping Leland 25-16, 25-21, 25-14 to claim the Division 4 title at Kellogg Arena. It was the program’s fourth MHSAA Finals championship, and first since 2001.
“It’s been our goal the whole entire season,” senior middle blocker Mackenzie Urick said. “We have a goal sheet, and that’s the top. Our mindset, that’s where it was, to win state. One game at a time, just to get here.”
The drive to get to Battle Creek and walk out victorious began more than a year ago, as the Hornets (49-6-3) were stung by a District Final loss to eventual Class C champion Bronson. While nobody could fault Mendon for suffering from a tough draw, the players were having none of it and set out to make sure they didn’t have that feeling again.
“After losing in the District Finals … it hurt,” senior middle blocker Cierra Nightengale said. “So we practiced, practiced, practiced. (First-year coach Heather Bowers) wasn’t even officially hired yet and we were in the gym practicing because we just wanted to get the season started. We knew our potential, and we just did it.”
Mendon dominated throughout the postseason, dropping just one set during its seven-match run to the championship. It swept both of matches at Kellogg Arena, as it had defeated No. 4 Southfield Christian 25-18, 25-15, 25-13 in a Semifinal on Friday.
It was top-ranked Leland (47-11-1), however, that was able to create the first bit of space between the two teams Saturday, going up 7-4 in the first set. But a Mendon timeout changed everything. The Hornets – ranked No. 2 heading into the postseason – went on a 5-0 run after the timeout, and controlled play through the rest of the set before taking it 25-16.
Leland led for much of the second set, but Mendon kept within striking distance and struck late to pull away for a 25-21 win to put itself one set away from the title.
“I think we just go hard every single point,” Nightengale said. “We go little games of five, which I think is what a lot of coaches teach, little games of five until you get to 25. The second game, they were up 19-16 or whatever, and we were like, ‘OK, time to push more.’ And we came out with the win.”
The third set was controlled by Mendon from early on, and as it went on, the Hornets’ confidence seemed to grow. Fittingly, it ended with an ace from sophomore outside hitter Anna Smith, who dominated throughout the match. Smith finished with 18 kills on 32 attacks. She was in on five of the last six points of the match, combining with Nightengale on a pair of blocks, adding two kills and the final ace.
“Back in the day when we played against (Battle Creek St. Philip), they had Allyson Doyle (who later played at Western Michigan), I feel the same way about this kid,” Leland coach Laurie Glass said of Smith. “She jumps really well, she’s up there long enough to see what she wants to see, and she’s got a whip for an arm. She’s going to be a great player – she's going to continue to be; she already is a great player.”
Kramer added 11 kills and five aces, while senior Aubrey Crotser had 22 assists. Senior Amaijha Bailey led the Hornets with 12 digs.
Leland was led by senior Allie Martin, who finished with 13 kills and five digs. Senior Ella Siddall had 30 assists and nine digs, while senior Hanna Elwell added seven kills.
For those Leland seniors, it ended a career that started with a Division 4 championship won during their freshman year in 2015.
“I think it says a lot about what we did this season,” Siddall said. “I think we just did our jobs all throughout, and every game it was steady. I think maybe today was a little different, but I’d say this season overall we did really good.”
PHOTOS: (Top) Mendon hoists its first MHSAA championship trophy won in volleyball since 2001 on Saturday at Kellogg Arena. (Middle) Leland’s Hanna Elwell winds up as Anna Smith (8) and Cierra Nightingale (5) get ready to block.
Irish Cap Dominating Run to Class B Win
November 23, 2013
By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor
BATTLE CREEK – Pontiac Notre Dame Prep volleyball coach Betty Wroubel has won 772 matches over the last 20 seasons. She had brought one other team to an MHSAA championship game, the eventual Class B champion in Fall 2007.
But it’s a fair argument none of her best dominated quite like her Fighting Irish did this fall in finishing off their second MHSAA title – although they had to win one of their toughest matches to finish the run.
Notre Dame, the top-ranked team at the start of the tournament, beat No. 3 North Branch in Tuesday’s Quarterfinal, then No. 2 Wayland in the semi before surviving a late surge by No. 5 Grand Rapids South Christian to win the championship match Saturday in four sets, 25-15, 25-19, 19-25, 25-23.
After falling behind two sets to none, the Sailors (46-12-1) simply wouldn’t go away – and nearly drew even in the fourth after trailing by as many as five points.
But the Irish’s dominant front line was just a little too much to overcome as it finished with 60 kills – good to tie for eighth-most in MHSAA Finals history during the rally-scoring era.
“We’ve been through so many challenges and all of these teams that we’ve been playing, and our team chemistry is just so amazing; we can just trust each other and be confident with ourselves,” Notre Dame junior hitter Katherine Carlson said. “We finished because we can really just trust each other on the court. We were getting our passes, getting our sets (and) we could just go up, be confident, be aggressive and swing.”
Notre Dame’s only losses this fall were to Class A Semifinalist Temperance Bedford and honorable mention Lake Orion. But it wasn’t until the North Branch win Tuesday that Wroubel became convinced her Irish were prepared to finish the week with the program’s second title.
Carlson had with 25 kills Saturday, tying for ninth-most in an MHSAA Final, followed by senior Dani McCormick with 17 and junior Jenna Sassack with 12. The Irish (62-2-1) also had the sixth-most assists in a Finals, 58, and piled up 85 digs with four in double figures led by sophomore Emma Kowalkowski with 20 – tied for 10th most in Finals history.
In the last set alone, Carlson responded to five South Christian points with kills, while McCormick ended two rallies.
“What Katherine Carlson does just amazes me sometimes on the court. I don’t know how she has that court sense, how she knows sometimes where to put the ball. There’s some rallies, and the other team is getting some confidence, and she comes up and puts the ball on the floor and brings it back to us,” Wroubel said. “And Dani McCormick the last four to six weeks has been outstanding.
“In volleyball, if you have one good player out there, you’re tough to beat. You have a couple of them, and you’re going to have to play some darn good defense to knock them off.”
But as the match went on, South Christian’s strengthened. The record book will list a few Sailors performances as well – their 10 blocks make the list, with junior Ashley VanderHorst’s seven ranking among the top individual totals.
South Christian coach Allison Sagraves called Notre Dame the toughest team hers played in the tournament, but the Sailors hung tough after the disappointing start.
That was characteristic of the team’s season. It lost a key middle blocker for the rest of the fall on Oct. 24, which could’ve sunk the Sailors – but instead became a turning point. South Christian was in a bit of a lull at that point, but emerged and didn’t give up a set in the postseason until the championship match.
“I thought we kept fighting no matter what, and the end of Game 4 just showed what these girls have. Just because they had 24, that didn’t mean we were going to roll over and end it,” Sagraves said. “We fought right back, and we really believed we were going to come back and win.
“We talked about that in our timeouts: We’re fighters, and we’re not going to quit, and we’re going to force them to beat us.”
Five seniors started for South Christian, and hitter Taylor Wierenga finished her final high school match with 17 kills, while Cassidy Vredevoogd had 13 and middle Danielle Oeverman had 10. Senior setter Emily Blankespoor had 41 assists, and five Sailors had double-digit digs: Blankespoor and sophomore Abbie Porter with 14 apiece, Vredevoogd with 12 (along with five blocks) and senior Morgan Torres and junior Clarissa VanderHoning with 10 apiece.
Junior Ashley Knutson had 36 assists and 12 digs for Notre Dame, while Carlson added 13 digs and junior Bella Bucchi had 17. Junior Hannah Antosz added 20 assists.
PHOTOS: (Middle) Pontiac Notre Dame Prep hitter Katherine Carlson follows through as her teammates anticipate a kill during Saturday’s championship match. (Middle) The Irish celebrate their first MHSAA championship since 2007. (Below) South Christian’s Danielle Oeverman sends the ball toward the net as two Notre Dame blockers prepare to deflect it.