River Ridge gets past Belleville — River Ridge topples Heights
River Ridge’s McKenzie Graf (1) and Skylar White (9) go up for the block versus Belleville. (Photo by A.J. Gates, Grant County Herald Independent)
Third-seeded River Ridge beat sixth-seeded and visiting Belleville in a five-set thriller in a Division 3 regional semifinal Thursday night.
The Lady Timberwolves were victorious by scores of 25-23, 24-26, 25-14, 11-25, and 15-5 to improve to 20-0 on the season.
Skylar White led the attack with 36 kills. Jaci Williams had 8 kills. Rylee Zinkle chipped in 7 kills. Chloe Stagman and Kendell Esser each contributed 4 kills. Sadie Crubel and McKenzie Graf also helped out with 3 kills. Faith Schier had an awesome match with 28 digs. Sadie Crubel also played a nice match having 16 digs. Skylar White and Kendell Esser had 14 digs in the match. McKenzie Graf had 19 assists and Jaci Williams had 18 assists. Kendell Esser added 7 assists.
“We had one of our better nights blocking at the net. Skylar White, Chloe Stagman, and Kendell Esser each had 2 blocks,” said River Ridge Coach Dianne Langmeier. “Sadie Crubel and Jaci Williams had 1 each. It was a very hard fought match. Belleville had some very athletic girls who hit the ball consistently. Luckily, in the first match that was so close, they missed a few serves. We only missed one serve all night. We had to keep on the offensive because if we didn’t hit the ball at them, they were going to slam it down on us. It was a very nice win for our girls. I am very proud of how they handled themselves when they came back from getting beat in the fourth game, 11-25, and then put the hammer down in the fifth game. The seniors really stepped up to the challenge and played like they wanted it. Skylar was hitting on all cylinders, Jaci had a nice block, and McKenzie Graf got the winning point with an ace serve.”
River Ridge senior Skylar White has more than 1,000 kills and 1,000 digs for her career. She is the first River Ridge player to accomplish that feat.
The River Ridge volleyball team travelled to Wisconsin Heights on Saturday night to take on a very talented team.
“We knew we were going to face some very aggressive serves,” said River Ridge Coach Dianne Langmeier. “The girls really did a nice job getting their serves up so we could set up our offense. Wisconsin Heights also does a very quick tempo with their offensive attack. We had some super digging from our defense specialist and libero, Faith Schier. The girls also did a super job reading who they were going to go to for the attack and getting some nice blocks. It was very fitting that our last play of the game was a dig by Faith Schier off a block. It was chased down by Sadie Crubel and put over the net with a backwards bump by Skylar White. They set it up on their side. All three of their hitters went up for a spike. Skylar and McKenzie figured they were going outside and double blocked it for a block kill point to win the match. The girls really played with heart and gave it their all.”
The scores in the match were 19-25, 25-19, 25-22, 25-23.
Third-seeded River Ridge will travel to top-seeded Brodhead on Thursday night for a Division 3 sectional semifinal.
Stats for the match
Kills:
Skylar White-29
Jaci Williams-8
Kendell Esser-4
Rylee Zinkle-4
Chloe Stagman-3
Sadie Crubel-1
Blocks:
Skylar White-5
Kendell Esser-3
Jaci Williams-1
McKenzie Graf-1
Assists:
Jaci Williams-15
McKenzie Graf-11
Kendell Esser-7
Digs:
Faith Schier-20
Skylar White-15
Jaci Williams-10
Kendell Esser-10
Sadie Crubel-5
Chloe Stagman-5
Ace Serves:
Rylee Zinkle-5
Skylar White-2
