EATON TWP. — Admiral King and Southview didn’t meet during the regular season, so that just made Wednesday’s Division I sectional volleyball match at Midview all the more intense.
In the end, unlike most recent meetings between the rivals, Admiral King came out on top, downing the Saints behind juniors Deidre Noble and Asia Chisholm 25-16, 25-21 11-25 and 25-21.
Admiral King, which advances to face Amherst on Saturday, raised its record to 12-9, while Southview fell to 8-14.
“It’s a really big victory for us because we haven’t beaten Southview in quite a few years,” King coach Terry Traut said. “We didn’t have a chance to play them this year and my girls really wanted to play them. We have to go back six or seven years before we had a sectional victory, too.
“I knew that this group could handle it. Instead of feeling deep down that it was going to be tough for them, they were fighting it out. I have a lot of the basketball players, so they’re comfortable with the success.”
A 2-0 lead in games and Noble’s play at the net were big parts of the Admirals’ win.
“We’re not a very good comeback team, so we knew we had our work cut out for us,” Southview coach Tom Price said. “This was our first time to play them. Records, everything get thrown out. It’s time to put it together and lay it all on the court. That’s pretty much what we did.”
Noble contributed on several blocks at the net and served the ball effectively at the end of the match. Chisholm won nine consecutive points on serve to separate the Admirals and Saints in Game 1.
“We changed history,” Noble said after the win. “Lorain has always been Southview over Admiral King when it comes to volleyball. We had our ups and downs, but we pulled through today.
“We have our own way of dealing with things,” Noble added. “We solved some conflicts with our team and we came together as a family.”
In Wednesday’s second game, North Olmsted lost a match, but the Eagles had bigger things to worry about when the night was through.
That’s because they had just watched teammate Amanda Balasko get taken off the court following an injury she suffered in the third game.
Avon Lake, which won the match in three games, 25-21, 25-12 and 25-23, was up two games to none, but the Eagles were mounting a comeback, leading 22-20 and preparing to return the ball.
But on a Kalli Wakefield serve, the Eagles watched as Balasko, a senior outside hitter, hustled after a ball near the bleachers. Balasko dove for the ball and crashed into the first row of stands.
Only a few seconds ticked by, but North Olmsted coach Jason Krucek and the officials knew something was wrong. They rushed to Balasko’s side and remained there until medical personnel took her to the hospital.
“She went over near the stands, rolled (and) hit the back of her head,” Krucek said after the match. “She was complaining that her head hurt and the top of her neck was hurting. That’s why they wanted to be real careful. She had full movement of her fingers, toes, arms and legs, but they didn’t want to take any chances. That’s what we know right now.
“I told the girls, ‘It’s kind of hard to talk about the game right now when that’s a bigger thing.’ We had talked to the girls about tournament time. Anything can happen. It could be your last game and here we are the perfect example.”
Avon Lake (9-14) moves on to face the Elyria Pioneers on Saturday afternoon. North Olmsted fell to 9-12.
“We split with them earlier in the season,” Avon Lake coach Jen Howser said of the Eagles. “It was really good to come out here, get our first win and, hopefully, take it into Saturday.
“(We tried) to move the ball around and get all of our hitters involved. Kalli, our setter, did a really good job tonight squaring up. She did a really good job using all of our hitters. Our passing was on tonight.”
Contact Matt Florjancic at 329-7135 or ctsports@chroniclet.com.

Columbia gets even in win over Wellington

ELYRIA — Momentum came dressed in green Wednesday night for the Division III sectional finals at Elyria High.
Columbia played well in all aspects to avenge an earlier loss at home to Wellington as the Raiders sidelined the Dukes in three games, 25-21,
25-22 and 25-10.
“Our goal was to be as flawless as possible, be as consistent as possible, pass well, play great defense and hit the ball,” said Raider coach Wendy Owens. “We had to pass the ball to our setter to utilize our front row.”
That was the match in a nutshell. Columbia consistently got the ball to CT player-of-the-week Emily Nagle and the junior managed to put the ball at the net for hitters Brooke Wenzel, Courtney Traut and Christa Wodarczyk, but it was the service line that eventually spelled defeat for the Dukes. Columbia aced eight points in the third game — three by Wenzel, two each by Traut and Rachel Ercegovic and one from Nagle.
“We felt comfortable (at the line),” said Nagle, who had 24 assists. “We were playing to win. We weren’t scared. We weren’t backing down at all.
“We really came out with a lot of intensity. We really wanted this game. Last time it didn’t work out our way. I think we were focused this game. We never let up.”
“We served real well,” Owens said. “We’ve been working on serving hard and making (the opponent) move to give us free balls. It enables us to use our quickness in the middle.”
“We had an opportunity to possibly take (either Game 1 or 2),” said Wellington coach Marsha Coultrip. “I felt if we could have got the momentum, it would have changed Game 3. Unfortunately, on both Games 1 and 2, we finished close and once Columbia got that (momentum), they never gave in to it.”
Columbia built leads in the first two games but Wellington kept the heat on. The Dukes ran off four straight points to close to 22-20 in Game 1 only to allow the Raiders to pull away again. Two nice sets by Nagle were put down by Wenzel, and then Nagel scored the final point when she shoved the ball over to the open floor rather than set it up.
In the second game, Wellington scored five straight points to tie it at 22, but again, Columbia rallied to score the final three points — one coming on a block by Ercegovic.
The final game was all Columbia. With Wenzel at the service line, the Raiders scored 10 straight points to open a 13-2 lead and built it to 19-5 off two Traut aces. Wenzel led the hitting with seven kills and she added four aces. Wodarczyk had 14 digs and she and Traut each had six kills.
For Wellington, Rachel Cook had seven points at the service line. Melissa Rennie had six kills and 14 digs.
The Raiders advance to play in next Tuesday’s district semifinal against tournament-tested Villa Angela-
St. Joseph (11-12), a five-game winner over Trinity in Wednesday’s opener. Columbia is 18-6, while Wellington finished 13-10. The Vikings, district runner-up last year, were the state runners-up in 2006.
“We’re ready,” Nagle said. “We know (VASJ) is a very good team, but we’ll work hard this week.”
Contact Tim Gebhardt at 329-7135 or ctsports@chroniclet.com.
 

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