Girls volleyball: Minooka beats Plainfield East, shares the SPC title

MINOOKA – It was bonus night for Minooka’s girls volleyball team Thursday in its final home match of the regular season.

In addition to earning a share of its second Southwest Prairie Conference title in the past three years, coach Carrie Prosek’s Indians recognized their senior class during a 25-12, 25-23 victory over Plainfield East.

Minooka (28-7, 10-1) entered Thursday’s match tied with Plainfield North and West Aurora at the top of the SPC standings with one loss each. The host Tigers won, 25-22, 25-14, against the Blackhawks and earned their share of the SPC title.

“Our conference is getting better every year, and I’m glad because that’s the competition we need to get ready for the playoffs,” Prosek said. “It’s nice that we’ve played a much tougher schedule than we have in the past. And this was a good senior night since I got all of our seniors to start, and that helps our morale since they did a great job. I kept them out there because I knew that could do it, and they did.”

The Indians used a service run with three aces from Hannah Hugunin and four kills from Heidi Bonde
(12 kills) to help them jump out to a 10-1 lead in the first set and stretched that lead to 16-2 on a service run from Zoey Seput (26 assists, 10 digs). East never got closer than 11 points the rest of that first set.

“It was our last conference home game, so we all just tried to make it worthwhile by making it fun and working together,” Hugunin said. “We just all have to be confident, know our skills and know that we can do it. I like this team because if we get a little down, we all come together to support each other and pick each other up.”

The second set seemed to be heading in the same direction after the Indians managed a 19-12 lead. But the Bengals didn’t give up and used a good service run by Taylor French to force three ties. They even managed to take a 23-22 lead before the Indians got kills from Holly Kropke, Bonde and Seput to end the match.

“At the beginning of the season, we had one goal which was to make every game exciting and to play our hardest, and I think we’ve really done that this whole year,” Kropke said. “We play for each other, and we want to go far because we know that we can since we have the talent. Playing Marist yesterday was a good eye-opener for the postseason.”

The Indians, who host a Class 4A regional Tuesday and Thursday that includes United Township, Normal West and Bradley-Bourbonnais, got solid contributions from Hailey Sperling (five kills) and Mia Alessio (16 digs). Coach Kurt Dolson’s Bengals, who meet Naperville Central in the Neuqua Valley Regional, were led by Grace Knutsen in kills (five).