Raiders wind up third in GNC, push Mosinee in first two sets
MEDFORD VOLLEYBALL
The Medford Raiders finished third in the final Great Northern Conference volleyball standings after closing the regular season Tuesday with a 3-0 loss at Mosinee.
The Raiders may have been swept while falling to 8-4 in the GNC and 16-15 overall, but head coach Cheryl Schreiner felt the team played its best ball of the season in game one and wasn’t far off in game two before running out of steam in the third set.
Mosinee is 11-0 in the GNC and 29-3 overall and extended its league winning streak to 55 matches. The five-time GNC champions drew the top seed in the area’s WIAA Division 2 sectional half-bracket and could see the Raiders again in a regional semifinal Oct. 21. Tomahawk’s sweep of Antigo Tuesday sealed second place in the GNC for the 9-3 Hatchets.
Mosinee has a first-round tournament bye, while Medford drew the eighth-seed and will host ninth-seeded conference rival Northland Pines (5-6, 10-15) in Tuesday’s regional opener at 7 p.m. Medford beat the Eagles 3-2 and 3-0 in the regular season.
“We came out loose and poised in the first set,” Medford head coach Cheryl Schreiner said of Tuesday’s effort. “It’s a charged atmosphere in this gym and we played very well, probably the best we’ve played all season. You could tell the girls wanted it.”
In fact, Medford led the first set all the way up to the very end when, in typical Mosinee fashion, the Indians just found a way to dig out of the hole the Raiders had them in.
Medford opened up early leads of 6-3 and 10-7, with the latter being forged after Katie Brehm collected a block kill and tip kill. Rynn Ruesch’s kill made it 11-8. The Indians got within 11-10, but Laurissa Klapatauskas scored on a back-row attack, Gabby Brunner served an ace and a long rally ended in a lift violation on Mosinee as the Raiders opened up a 15-10 lead.
Klapatauskas got a kill and Brehm and Martha Miller both tooled winners off Mosinee blocks to widen the lead to 18-12.
The Raiders were particularly effective early on in using Mosinee’s blocks to their advantage, deflecting shots off of them for points.
“We’ve been working in practice on tooling blockers and we’ve been also trying to get our hitters to see the blockers, so when they’re up they’re not hitting directly into the block,” Schreiner said. “They’re using those outside hands and fingertips to get those tools.”
Abbi Martin got a couple of blocks against Ruesch to pull the Indians within 19-18, but Medford kept its poise and went on another mini run that almost closed out the set with two Mosinee errors, Miller’s tool and Katie Lybert’s making it 23-18. The momentum, though, swung when the Raiders missed a serve and the Indians dug up a potential block kill by Ruesch against Martin and turned the point into a block kill from Martin against Ruesch. Alexis Jonas got a kill and Martin put down two more in the 7-0 run that gave Mosinee the 25-23 win.
“Our defense was really good, which is what you want at this time of the year,” Schreiner said. “We just need to clean up those little things now like service errors and staying out of the net.”
A close 12-10 score in game two, turned into a 20-12 lead for Mosinee, but Medford clawed its way back into it and made it interesting. Klapatauskas scored yet another kill off a blocker and Brunner served an ace. Mosinee got a Jonas kill and a Lisa Maurer ace to go up 23-14, but Megan Fredrikson got two kills, Allie Paulson served an ace and Fredrikson scored again to make it 23-20. She just missed the deep corner on a shot that would’ve cut the lead to two, but she scored by tipping a shot off a block to make it 24-21, but Mosinee got the next point to take a commanding 2-0 lead in the match.
The Indians wasted no time in putting away the third set, jumping out to a 13-0 lead and winning it 2510.
Ruesch notched six kills in the match, Fredrikson had five, Klapatauskas and Paulson had four each and Brehm had three. Paulson’s 17 assists led the Raiders, while Lybert had eight. Paulson had three of Medford’s eight service aces. Lybert and Brunner had two each. Miller led the Raiders with nine digs, Olivia Krug had eight and Paulson and Brunner had seven each.
While winning a best-of-five match in Mosinee in the post-season will be a daunting task, the Raiders gained confi dence Tuesday knowing they have the ability to hang with the Indians if that matchup happens next week.
“We have to take it one at a time,” Schreiner said. “We know Northland Pines is going to come in raring to go and we know it’s hard to beat a team three times in a season. Hopefully we’ll give ourselves another chance to come back here.”
2-0 on Saturday
The Raiders were also in Mosinee Saturday and earned sweeps of Rhinelander and Northland Pines in the GNC’s second Saturday meet of the fall.
The Hodags pushed Medford in the middle set, but otherwise the Raiders were in control in a 25-15, 25-21, 25-11 victory in round one.
Ruesch had seven kills, Fredrikson and Miller had six apiece, Klapatauskas had five, Brehm had four and Paulson, Autumn Krause and Hailey Fisher had three each in the win. Emma Brost led the team with 14 assists, Lybert had nine and Paulson had eight. Klapatauskas had five of Medford’s 12 service aces, while Brunner and Miller had two each.
Klapatauskas and Krause had 11 digs each. Ruesch had two blocks.
Pines pushed Medford to the limit in game one, but the Raiders prevailed 2624 and went on to 25-14, 25-19 wins in sets two and three. Fredrikson had 12 kills and Ruesch had 10 in that match, Miller had eight and Klapatauskas and Brehm had five each.
Paulson had 18 assists and Lybert had five. Lybert had seven of Medford’s nine aces. Ruesch had three solo blocks and Klapatauskas had two. Miller, Brunner and Klapatauskas had 12 digs apiece and Krug had 11.
Allie Paulson
