Benet can’t seal the deal, falls in three sets to Marist in Class 4A state title match

NORMAL — For three straight seasons, Benet has found itself just one set away from getting its hands on the Class 4A championship trophy.

But for the third straight season, the quest ended just short.

After Benet took the first set, Marist stormed back with wins in the final two sets for a 19-25, 25-16, 25-19 win on Saturday at CEFCU Arena.

Benet settled for second place for the third straight season.

Marist (33-9), which won its third state title and first since going back-to-back in 2017 and 2018, won its last 15 matches of the season after a 25-18, 25-16 loss to Benet on Oct. 8.

“Marist has been hot for a month,” Benet coach Brad Baker said. “The first set we were able to control them for a bit. But then they went on a run, and they played like how they played for the last month. They played awesome, and they deserved to win.”

While the three sets all played out differently in the long run, Benet found itself in a rut early in each set, with Marist starting each set with leads of 5-0, 4-0 and 5-1 before the Redwings took action.

In the first set, Baker opted for a timeout, allowing the players to rekindle their thoughts and get their heads into the match.

And the approach worked. After grabbing an 11-10 lead for their first in the set, the Redwings rattled off six consecutive points, thanks to the service of junior Ellie Stiernagle, to build a lead that the Redwings would not give up.

“I just wanted it for my team really bad,” Stiernagle said. “I just wanted to go out there and play my best for my team.”

Part of the success for the Redwings in the first set came from the excellent play of libero Aniya Warren. The Purdue commit, who was named to the Class 4A All-State team earlier in the day, put up nine of her 18 digs in the first set.

“I wasn’t going to leave anything out on the floor. I was going to give everything that I had and not have any regrets,” Warren said. “I knew it was do-or-die, all-or-nothing. So I just wanted to go out there and make my teammates proud and do everything I could for them, because they’ve worked hard all season, so I felt like I owed it to them.”

The Redwings used the same approach in the second set, with Baker calling a timeout once again after the RedHawks scored the first points of the set. And while Benet managed to work back to a tie, and grab the lead for a bit, Marist used the hot hands of senior outside hitter Bella Bullington (16 kills) and junior hitter Savannah Weathers (10 kills) to leverage a seven-point streak to secure the set.

In the third, Baker omitted from taking the timeout after the run, but rather made a rare change in the formation. Baker decided to send Stiernagle into the game at setter while moving senior Audrey Asleson, who’s been the setter all season long, in at outside hitter.

It was just the third time this season that Benet, which was going for its fifth state title, had been taken to three sets.

“We just felt like we needed a bit more offense at the time,” Baker said. “Audrey has attacked for us in the past, so we just knew we needed to get that extra boost early. Whether it was getting a set in a different spot or producing some different swings, we just needed some more offense.”

And initially, it did. The Redwings worked back to a 6-6 tie, and eventually tied it again at 11-11.

But after that, it was all Marist. Bullington, a Northwestern commit, and Weathers dominated at the net to help the RedHawks go on a 14-8 stretch to end the match, with Bullington hammering down the final kill in the match.

“They just have a lot of really good volleyball players,” Baker said. “We knew going in that it was going to be tough to score on them. We tried to make it hard on them, but they’re a great team.”

Senior outside hitter Brooklynne Brass led Benet at the net offensively with 12 kills on the night, with junior middle Lynney Tarnow adding 10 more while also adding four blocks. Senior middle Gabby Stasys also excelled at the net, putting up five kills to match her five blocks on the night.

Benet ends the season with a 40-2 record, dropping only five sets on the entire season. And although the season, and her high school career, didn’t end the way she would have wanted, Warren, who’s been the starting libero for the Redwings for the last four seasons, said that she wouldn’t have picked any other team to go out on the court and battle for the state title with.

“Although we wanted our final game to end differently, we showed up in almost every single game this season, and we stuck with each other through thick-and-thin and never doubted that the other player wanted it,” Warren said. “I give props for everyone on this team for being able to come out here with a chip on their shoulder and give it our all. And I couldn’t be more proud of them.

“The girls coming back here next season, I want them to go out there and do the same thing and go win it all, because they deserve it. I know everything I ever wanted in my career is a state title, but I’m not going to have that opportunity. But I couldn’t be more thankful for the last four years of Benet volleyball.”