Girls volleyball: St. Ignatius sweeps Providence Catholic to hand Celtics first loss of the season

NEW LENOX – The beginning of the 2024 season had been nothing but good times for the Providence Catholic girls volleyball team. The Celtics were roaring through each match, winning every one, often with little trouble.

Unfortunately for the Celtics fans on hand, that wasn’t the case Tuesday night. However, for the team, that may end up working to their benefit.

In the short term, Providence’s loss to St. Ignatius in straight sets will sting. The Celtics fought in the first set, fell behind and fought back late to make it competitive. Set 2, however, saw the Wolfpack seize control relatively early and never look back. The result? A final score of 25-23, 25-15.

Again, it was far from what people had become accustomed to from the Celtics’ first six matches. Providence entered Tuesday night with an unblemished record and only dropped one set. Seeing them fall in straight sets was a surprise, but coach Lee Rucinski noted the quality of opponent St. Ignatius is. He also pointed out that playing such an opponent may end up paying dividends.

“It’s good to play a very high-level, quality opponent that shows us where we’re at,” Rucinski said. “You start the season with six straight wins, you can start to fall into the trap of, ‘Everything we’re doing is great, and we don’t need to work on anything.’ Being able to play [St. Ignatius] and realizing that serve receive still dictates every match at a high level [is important.] They destroyed us on both sides of that game.

“It’ll be nice to get some film out of this and go back to practice and work on some things.”

There were some bright spots. Cali Tierney tallied seven kills. Abbey Knight finished with five. Demi Carbone chipped in eight assists, while Delaney Purtill added six. The team put up a combined total of three blocks and three aces in the two sets played.

Plus they showed some serious fight in the opening set. After falling behind 6-3, the Celtics chipped away to draw even. Carbone and Co. had the Celtics battling back and forth with Providence trailing just 13-12 when the Wolfpack began to build up some distance. A 6-2 run gave St. Ignatius a 19-14 edge.

The Celtics looked dead in the water down 23-18, but a kill by Purtill got things rolling in their favor to the tune of a 5-1 run to get them back within one. St. Ignatius ultimately scored that final point, though, and took the set.

The Celtics started the second set rather strongly. They went up 5-3 before the full moon rose for the Wolfpack. A 5-1 run gave St. Ignatius a 10-6 lead, and the Wolfpack later followed it with an 8-2 run to go up 19-9. It was 6-6 the rest of the match, but that was far too late to change the result.

Rucinski stressed matches like this are important in building a consistent winner.

“You saw what we did [in the first set],” he said. “We lost 23-25, missing half our serves. That’s almost impossible to do, and yet we did it. We can play with some of the best teams in the state. We are one of the best teams in the state for 3A. It’s just a matter now of dealing with some adversity and seeing how we respond.”

Providence won’t have to wait long for another competition. The Celtics play Andrew on the road Wednesday. Rucinski said he’s confident the Celtics will get the ball rolling again.

“It’s a quick turnaround,” he said. “We just have to clean up some of our sloppy play. We definitely made some uncharacteristic plays. We knew this was a big game, and I think we might have applied some pressure to ourselves. We just have to come into tomorrow with a new mindset and a new outlook on life.

“We just have to realize we’re a good team that had a bad night.”