Landfair is Herald-News All-Area Girls Volleyball Player of the Year

There are very few girls volleyball players who have been able to record 500 or more kills during a season in Illinois history, so when that impressive feat is achieved, it’s definitely deserving of some real respect.

And that’s just what Plainfield Central junior outside hitter Taylor Landfair accomplished this past season when she finished with a total of 505 kills. The Wildcats standout also had 40 blocks, 43 aces and 242 digs.

She was the Most Valuable Player of the Southwest Prairie Conference and also earned all-tournament honors at Plainfield North, Wheaton Warrenville South and Plainfield Central. And she was also recognized as a first-team All-Stater by Illprepvb.com.

For her accomplishments throughout the 2018 season, Landfair has been selected as The Herald-News Girls Volleyball Player of the Year.

Landfair helped lead the Wildcats to one of their winningest seasons in program history. They finished with a 27-9 final record, which was one victory shy of the record of 28 wins that was established in 1988 when Plainfield reached the IHSA quarterfinals.

Coach Erik Vogt’s Wildcats won the Southwest Prairie Conference championship with an 8-1 record and drew a No. 3 seed in the rugged Class 4A Plainfield North Sectional as they looked to capture their third regional title in the past five years. But they were upset in the finals of the Lockport Regional by the host Porters, who avenged an earlier defeat.

While disappointed that her team wasn’t able to go a little further in the state playoffs, Landfair still was very proud of all of their accomplishments throughout the season.

“I think that we were successful throughout the season and that we worked really hard in the gym and our coaches were also helpful in practice,” Landfair said. “So we knew what we had to do in bad situations, and that helped us through. I really enjoyed this season.”

Landfair already had committed to continue both her volleyball career and education at the University of Minnesota and once again figures to enjoy another successful year of offseason play competing along and against some of the best players in the nation.

Vogt understandably was very impressed with Landfair’s performance throughout the season and looks forward to many more accomplishments from her in the future.

“Taylor had an outstanding junior year for the Wildcats,” Vogt said. “She was an offensive juggernaut. Every team we faced knew Taylor would be getting the ball, and she still produced for us. I haven’t seen a player score as effortlessly as Taylor.”

And the Wildcats coach also really liked how Landfair was not only a huge offensive threat for his team, but also performed well on defense.

“Taylor was also one of the best passers on the team,” Vogt said. “It’s very uncommon to be so good on the offensive side of the ball and then be a great defender. Taylor was the total package this year.”

• Landfair leads this year’s Herald-News All-Area team, which features 28 individuals who also enjoyed successful seasons.

All of the honorees earned all-conference recognition except for two who were on very successful teams that only received two all-conference selections.

This year’s team is different from others in the past for reasons that are fairly obvious. There is no way that anybody can objectively rank which players belong on a series of first-, second-, third- or special mention teams since no one can observe the wide range of players who are competing in all of the different conferences involving our local schools.

So rather than just making an uneducated guess on such a selection process, I’ve deferred to the area’s coaches to provide us with a better selection of who were the top players from throughout the area and incorporated them into one all-area squad.

Joliet Catholic Academy, Lockport and Plainfield Central lead the way with three selections apiece while Bolingbrook, Joliet West, Lincoln-Way Central, Lincoln-Way East, Lincoln-Way West, Minooka and Plainfield North had two all-area selections.

Each of the 28 All-Area selections are pictured along with a recap of their achievements on the following two pages.

– Curt Herron