Volleyball: Minooka not at its best, but wins another regional title

NAPERVILLE – For the entire volleyball season, Minooka has been the team to beat.

Six of seven starters are committed to colleges, and the Indians can boast that they have the best unit. They have the two hardest swinging outsides in the area, the most talented right side and libero. Minooka’s middles dominate in blocking and barely anyone comes close to the number of assists the setter has.

So what type of team is Minooka?

Well, first off, the Indians are not a team that accepts any win. In the 4A Naperville Central Regional final Thursday, the Indians did not play their game. Minooka still walked away with a 25-23, 25-20 win over Naperville Central to claim its fourth consecutive regional title.

“We need to work on our unforced errors,” Minooka coach Carrie Prosek said. “I told them that I’m not happy right now. We came out scared. I told them last night that they have pressure because of what everyone expects, but we don’t need to worry about that. We need to go out and have fun.”

The Indians will face Naperville North at 5:30 p.m. Monday in the Waubonsie Valley Sectional semifinal, with Benet Academy taking on Waubonsie in the other semifinal.

“We have to have the same mindset that we’ve had all year,” Holly Bonde said. “We’re taking it one step at a time, but we have the big picture in our head. We’re going to practice really hard and be ready. The coaches will tell us what we’ll need to do, and we’ll prepare.”

Although Minooka (35-2) needs to work on some parts of its game before next Tuesday, blocking was on fire.

The Indians totaled nine blocks, with seniors Bonde and Sammi Hermann tallying five blocks apiece. Olivia Klank and sophomore Zoey Seput added three blocks each. More impressive than the number was the style.

Central looked like it was going to force a third set. Sarah Schank took a big swing to tie the game at 19 and earned another kill for the lead. The Redwings scored again and forced a Minooka timeout. Bonde, Rocky Perinar and Prosek noticed Central had two servers in one rotation, which meant the Redwings went out of rotation.

The ball and points were taken away. Then Hermann started blocking anything hit near her. The middle had three blocks, teaming up with Bonde and Alli Papesh. Hermann and Bonde ended the game with a block.

“Our middles and our pins did awesome blocking,” Perinar said. “In the first game, we struggled. Right away we had a timeout and pushed through it. We did great blocking, and it impacted the game.”

Seput dished out 18 assists, and libero Taylor Baranski matched with 18 digs. Following her strong postseason performance last year, Perinar led the Indians with nine kills, while Bonde added seven.

The regional title is the fourth in succession for the program and senior Papesh and the third for the remaining seniors. It’s also a first step toward Redbird Arena.

“It’s a milestone that we had to get over,” Perinar said. “It’s one more step to the state finals.”

This is the last postseason for the seniors, and the end goal was always to finish first when it counted. Sometimes outside factors can put a team off course.

For the Indians, health played a factor this week.

On Tuesday, one of the team’s big supporters had a scare that affected everyone. The core players and their families have been a team for the past four years, and it hit everyone hard.

As if that were not enough, two days later and on championship day, one player had to go to the hospital because she was in a lot of pain. She got cleared and played.

So what type of team is Minooka?

The Indians are the team that rallies around each other when one player is down. On Thursday, they played for each other and did what was needed to win, even if it wasn’t pretty.

“There were things that happened, but we’re such a close-knit team,” Bonde said. “We’re kind of a family. We zoned in and put everything else on the side today.”

Minooka was far from 100 percent Thursday night, but the Indians were talented enough to win a regional title in two games.