Volleyball: Richmond-Burton tops Woodstock North, captures Kishwaukee River Conference title

RICHMOND – Richmond-Burton ended each of the past three seasons looking up at Woodstock North in the Kishwaukee River Conference.

On Wednesday, the Rockets finally got to experience that winning feeling.

After dropping the first set and trailing halfway through the second, R-B came back to defeat North 23-25, 25-22, 25-16 and claim the KRC championship for the first time in seven years.

[ Photos: Woodstock North vs. Richmond-Burton volleyball ]

The Rockets (23-5, 12-0 KRC), who were runner-up to the Thunder last season, won their first KRC championship in 2016. Winning the conference for a second time and beating the three-time defending champions to do it was something they’ve been looking forward to for awhile.

The loss also eliminated North (17-11, 9-3) from KRC title contention with only two conference matches left.

“I’ve been waiting for this for four years,” said senior outside hitter and captain Maggie Uhwat, who had eight kills, eight digs and an ace. “We’ve been waiting for this for so long, so it’s a really good feeling to know that we locked it up.

“It feels great.”

The Rockets were in danger of being swept by North, trailing 16-14 in the second set.

R-B then went on to score the next five points. Junior outside hitter Elissa Furlan had a block, freshman middle blocker Dani Hopp had a kill and freshman libero Lanee Cooley tallied an ace. After a timeout by the Thunder, Cooley had another ace and Furlan another kill to go up 19-16.

“I think during that time in the game, I just became super locked in,” said Furlan, who recorded 12 kills, seven digs and three aces. “I dialed in on what I had to do. I think we all just did what we needed to do in that moment.”

Cooley said the nerves were working against her in the second set.

“Just had to stay calm,” said Cooley, who tallied nine digs and three aces, including two in the second set. “There was a whole student section cheering for us, and I wanted to make my coach proud. I was just trying to hit my zone as perfect as I could and not think about it too much.

“If I thought about it too much, I’d mess up.”

Rockets coach Mike Kamholz was happy to see his team finally get past North.

“It comes down to nerves for us,” Kamholz said. “For whatever reason, Woodstock North makes us nervous. They’re a really good team coached by a really good coach, and they know what they’re doing.

“We always tell them, ‘The only team that can beat us is us.’ They pulled themselves together, stopped overreacting to every play that happened and played our type of volleyball. These past four years have been so close. I couldn’t be more proud.”

Junior setter Alex Hopp had 28 assists, 10 digs and three aces for R-B, and Dani Hopp had 11 kills and two aces, including the match winner.

North was led by junior libero Devynn Schulze (10 digs, three aces), senior Dani Hansen (five kills, three blocks, two aces, eight assists) and sophomore Gabby Schefke (seven assists, six kills, eight digs. Lexi Hansen had five kills and nine digs and Clara Klasek had four blocks and two kills.

The Thunder trailed 8-4 at the start of the third set and never recovered.

“When you’re in a loud gym and an intense environment with good teams and good players, if you make enough mistakes, they’re going to capitalize on them,” North coach Eric Schulze said. “We were making too many mistakes, they capitalized on them quickly, and we never regained composure.

“It’s tough right now because we feel a little snakebitten. We’ve gone three sets with a lot of really great teams, and we haven’t been able to solve it yet. I think we need one just to know we can.”

Richmond-Burton can finish a perfect conference season with wins against Marengo and Plano next week.

For now, the Rockets will enjoy their big win.

“Revenge for the last three years, it feels great,” Furlan said.