Volleyball: Bureau Valley beats Hall again, Round 3 coming up at regional

SPRING VALLEY – The Bureau Valley Storm and Hall Red Devils are becoming fast acquaintances on the volleyball court.

The Storm defeated the Red Devils for the second time in a week, taking a 25-20, 25-17 decision on senior night Tuesday at Hall in Three Rivers Conference East Division action.

They will reset and meet for the third time in a Class 2A regional opener at Hall on Monday.

“We played well. We got the job done. They did what we needed to do,” BV coach Caitlyn DeMay said. “We have a few tweaks we need to do come postseason. We have Stark County and then Hall next Monday. Looking forward to it.”

Hall (7-21-1, 1-11) gave Bureau Valley (12-9, 7-5) a battle in the first game, taking a 10-8 lead. Emma Stabler served for four straight points to give the Storm a 14-10 lead and came back with a hit at 18-14.

Sophomore Kennedy Wozniak and senior Ella Taliani hit for back-to-back kills to keep Hall close at 19-17. Wozniak served up an ace to make it 20-19 BV.

Storm setter Kate Salisbury tipped for a sideout at 22-20 and followed with a block. Stabler, who finished the night with a team-high 10 kills, hit again to set the Storm up for game point.

As much of its season has gone, Hall continued its up-and-down ride in the second game. It took a quick 4-0 lead only to have Kate Stoller serve for 10 straight Storm points, capped by a Stabler spike, to make it 11-4 BV.

“Just like all year this year, we’ve been up and down, up and down. We haven’t been able to finish,” Hall coach Carolyn Bryant said. “We had a good night last week on our Pink Night against Kewanee, and they were on a little bit of a high, but it’s hard. The seniors wanted to fight. Our setter and hitters weren’t connecting tonight. It just stinks.”

Hall battled back within 17-14 but got no closer with the Storm scoring match point on a Hall hitting error.

Freshman Keely Lawson and junior Kate Salisbury had six kills each, while junior Ella Thacker added five. Salisbury set up the others when she wasn’t hitting, making good on 19 assists.

Stoller finished with 17 points, including three aces, with five digs. Nikki Kerber led the Storm with 11 digs.

The Bureau County and Three Rivers rivals will do it all over again in Monday’s regional at Hall, this time facing a season-ending outcome. There will be emotions to different degrees with Bureau Valley holding a 2-0 record against Hall heading into their third meeting.

“I always hate playing a team three times, but that’s an old wives’ tale,” DeMay said. “But if we get our job done, we’ll be fine. We’ll play our game and everybody starts the postseason at 0-0. That’s what’s fun about it.”

Bryant is indeed hopeful the third time will be the charm for the Red Devils.

“We have them on Monday. I always tell the girls, it’s always harder to beat somebody three times,” she said. “And it’s usually a pretty good game, so if we’re on our game, I’m hopeful we’ll pull out a win for our first regional game.”

Bryant said playing a team so close to the postseason can help for scouting purposes, but said it works both ways.

“Sometimes (it helps) because you might not be able to go back and watch a bunch of film and get caught up and see what we’ve done,” she said. “But sometimes, it’s not very good, because (the winning team’s) got that momentum going into the next week.”

Notes: The BV sophomores won 25-14, 25-19 to finish 9-3 in conference while improving to 17-6-2 overall. BV also won the freshmen match 25-5, 25-11.