Wilmington tops Streator to stay unbeaten in ICE

STREATOR – There are times when finding wins on an opponent’s home floor proves elusive over consecutive seasons.

According to Wilmington volleyball coach Kelly Van Duyne, that has been the case for the Wildcats in the recent seasons at Streator’s Lowell “Pops” Dale Gymnasium.

However, Thursday night the streak ended for Wilmington on the Bulldogs’ court as they earned a hard-fought 25-23, 25-22 victory to improve to 14-5 overall and stay unbeaten at 7-0 in Illinois Central Eight Conference play. Streator dropped to 8-9-2 and 4-3.

“This is my third year coaching, and even before that, it never seemed to fail that Wilmington teams just could not find a way to win in this gym,” Van Duyne said. “The goal tonight was stay up mentally no matter the situation. We came here wanting to stay undefeated in conference play, but also with the goal of breaking the curse that seems to come with us playing here. Last year we lost here and it cost us a share of the conference title, and the girls back this season remember that.”

Wilmington was led by Rachel Smith (six kills, two aces, a block, 12 service points), Reese Van Duyne (five kills), Molly Southall (four kills), Maggie Lindsey (three kills) and Addison Billingsley (five points, two aces).

“It was one of those matches where it was truly a team effort,” coach Van Duyne said. “From our serve receive to our passing to our setting and to our hitting, every one of my players stepped up at key times when we needed them to. We did a great job of staying mentally tough. When we had a bad point or mistake we let it go and moved on. I really think we played an overall solid match against a really good opponent.”

Streator was paced by Sonia Proksa (seven kills, two blocks, an ace), Aubrey Jacobs (six kills, seven points, a block, two aces), Shaelyn Groesbeck (three kills, four points) and Sophia Snow (three blocks).

In the back-and-forth opening set, Streator held a 23-22 advantage after kills by Jacobs and Proksa. But from there, a Bulldogs’ bad pass, and a block then an ace by Smith gave Wilmington the triumph.

Streator jumped out to leads of 10-3 and 12-6 in the second set, but Wilmington clawed back to even things at 12 with two kills from Resse Van Duyne and an ace by Skylar Knight.

The teams traded points until a block by Snow and a kill by Proska gave Streator a 19-17 lead.

Wilmington responded with five straight points, two on aces by Smith, to lead 22-19. From there kills by Southall and Lindsey helped close out the set and match.

“This was the best we’ve played this week, and it’s been a long and tough week,” Streator coach Julie Gabehart said. “This was our fourth match in four nights, so we haven’t had the practice time to work on things. Tonight was as consistent as we’ve been the past four matches, but we just came up a couple points short in each set tonight. We had a couple of lapses at the wrong times, and Wilmington took advantage of them. We opened the door, especially in the middle of the second set, and they walked through it.

“Sonia has been a big contributor for us all season and tonight she was really good. She had a rough start to the week, but she turned that around tonight and looked like herself again. Along with Sonia, Aubrey Jacobs has been solid all season at the net for us and she was huge again for us tonight.”

Both teams are off until Tuesday when Wilmington travels to play Reed-Custer and Streator hosts Herscher.