Elmwood recovers, shocks Lady Crusaders

KEWANEE — The greatest volleyball season in the history of Marquette Academy ended on Monday night not with the sting of a spike, but with the thud of a block.

After breezing through the first set looking like the confident, talented, hard-slamming ballclub that blew away the school mark for victories, the Lady Crusaders very suddenly could do nothing right, or more specifically, Elmwood – playing in its first sectional game ever — could do nothing wrong.

Down a set but up by a point in the second, an MA service error and five straight points by Isabella Guppy started the Lady Trojans on a roll that not only evened the match, but carried all the way through the third for a 12-25, 25-12, 25-15 win over the Cru here in the Wethersfield Class 1A Sectional semifinals.

From that 8-7 edge in Set 2, Elmwood scored 25 of the next 33 points, using a combination of solid hitting from Taylor Herman, strong back-row defense from Briana Glover and Alexia Herman and tough blocking led by Guppy to render the Lady Cru’s powerful offense almost moot.

Those efforts will have the Lady Trojans (27-4) taking on Illini Bluffs in Wednesday’s sectional finale at 6 p.m. Bluffs was a 25-17, 26-24 winner over Princeville in Monday’s opening semifinal.

For Marquette, the Tri-County regular-season and tournament champion and Roanoke-Benson Regional winner, its 30-5 record set a pretty high bar for future Lady Crusaders.

“All good things must come to an end,” sighed a disappointed MA coach Mindy McConnaughhay. “We came out gangbusters, man, and it was beautiful. I think we caught them off-guard just as they did us in the second. They’re a good team. They kept us out of system pretty well and for an offensive team like ours, that was our downfall.

“We definitely got timid and tipped way too much. They kept us on our heels and give their setter credit, she sped their offense up a ton after that first set and that it caught us off-guard. Unfortunately that led to a little run of points and we were never able to rebound from that. There was no doubt in my mind that we were working hard, trying hard. It just didn’t come together. Every time we did something right, something bad would happen right after. It was a tough night.”

Not so tough in the first set when three points each from Addie McConnaughhay, Grace Jeanblanc (six kills) and Ellen Wheatland opened up a 14-4 MA lead. Later, one of five Elmwood service errors in that game was followed by an all-but-game-ending five straight points by Emma Thomas to make it 23-10.

But the second set was a different story all together. The Lady Trojans came out more confident and aggressive and took the lead for good when Guppy’s five-point string upped the edge to 14-7 that was quickly expanded to 19-10 and 23-11.

Finally, four points from Annie Herman gave EHS a 5-1 advantage in the deciding set and after two points by Jeanblanc closed MA within 8-6, the Trojans’ hitting and blocking seemed to notch three points for every one of Marquette’s. That left the Lady Cru with a look of shock and frustration that never left their faces the rest of the way.

After that second-set burst started for Elmwood, the locals managed just seven points off its own serve the remainder of the match. Aubrey McCallum and Ellie Eager finished with five kills each, McConnaughhay 11 digs and Thomas 17 assists.

“I don’t know if that first set was nerves or not because we’ve never been in this situation before. We’d never won a regional until this year, so we’d never played in a sectional game before,” said Elmwood coach Jen Stratton. “I told my co-coach (Penny Silzer) that we are not seasoned winners, but we are winners. They have the ability to self-regulate and they turned things around.

“Isabella had a very good game blocking for us tonight. We take a lot of pride in our defense and our serve receive … We’re a solid, well-rounded team that works really well together and gets the job done. Sometimes it’s ugly like that first set, but eventually they get it done.”