Girls Volleyball: Dynamic duo of Grace Hinchman, Anna Loberg lead Geneva past Batavia

GENEVA – Grace Hinchman and Anna Loberg were a dynamic duo that proved too much for Batavia to overcome Tuesday.

Hinchman, a senior libero and Loyola recruit, does it defensively. Loberg, a junior setter, fuels the offense.

They fueled the Vikings past the Bullodgs 25-11, 25-11 in Geneva.

Hinchman had 11 digs to lead Geneva, which is nothing new.

“Hinchman did fantastic defensively for us," Geneva coach Annie Seitelman said. "It’s nice when you know the ball is going to get dug."

Loberg ran the show with15 assists, 10 digs, four kills and one ace.

“Anna Loberg did a really nice job of running our offense and distributing the ball,” said Seitelman.

The Vikings came out on fire when, kept the momentum and never let the Bulldogs get back in during the 25-11 first set.

"We knew what we had to do," Lobert said. "Once we were up, we just had to keep the energy we had."

That's not hard, given the opponent.

“It’s always fun playing Batavia," Seitelman said. "Records aside, the kids come in and are excited about this match. Our kids did a really nice job of starting off strong. It helped in those first few points when they made those service errors. It allowed us to get that lead in the beginning.”

It was an important game for Batavia, the only time this season the Bulldogs will play Geneva since they are no longer in the same sectional. Geneva came in 3-0 in the DuKane Conference, Batavia 2-1.

“This was our opportunity. They have already beaten [St. Charles] East and [St. Charles] North and Wheaton-Warrenville South. This was our opportunity to get a “W” and still challenge them for that number one spot," Batavia coach Lori Trippi-Payne said. "I wish we would have played better and given them a game tonight."

The Bulldogs overthought the game and were trying to do too much for the win tonight.

“We started off a little weak and just never got our heads in the game the way we needed to," said Batavia senior setter Priya Dave, who had five digs. "I know how our team runs and we can play way better than that. We just didn’t show up today. Obviously, it’s a conference game and a rivalry and that got in our heads too."

The Vikings came out a little slower in the second set and were down 6-3. They recovered and went on a 9-0 run to take them ahead 12-6.

“We didn’t come out with the same intensity," Seitelman said. "Once they had that built out lead at the beginning, we talked about how we were responding."

“I think we had some communication errors, but we knew how to fix them right away. Once we fixed them, we were perfectly fine,” said Loberg.

Batavia tried to get back in the game, but it came down to some unforced errors. The set ended 25-15.

“We were playing with them,” said Trippi-Payne.