Volleyball: Fieldcrest takes third matchup with Tri-Valley to win regional

MINONK – The Fieldcrest volleyball team did what winning teams normally do when the postseason comes around in Thursday’s Class 2A Fieldcrest Regional championship against Tri-Valley.

Make limited mistakes and play with a load of confidence.

With a vocal home crowd cheering them on, the No. 3-seeded Knights captured the program’s 10th title and first since 2018 with a 25-21, 26-24 triumph over the No. 2-seeded Vikings, who claimed the Heart of Illinois Conference regular-season and tournament titles.

Fieldcrest (28-4) had dropped two previous meetings with Tri-Valley (31-4-1) this season.

“Playing here in our gym with our fans screaming and yelling gave us a ton of energy, for sure,” senior libero Carolyn Megow said. “Yes, we had lost to them twice this year, but we were so excited to get another chance to play them. I think we did so much better at the net against them than the first two times and it’s something we worked on doing better in practice on [Wednesday].

“We also didn’t dig ourselves a hole like the first two times against them and we stayed confident and in control.”

The Knights advance to play Seneca Regional winner Peotone in the Prairie Central Sectional semifinal at 7 p.m. Monday

“I thought we did a great job of staying cool and we played smart,” said senior hitter Ashlyn May, who finished with a team-best 11 digs. “There were a few times where some things didn’t go our way, but it seemed like in those moments we became tougher and more focused. I’m not sure we did that in our first two times playing them and as a result we didn’t win.”

Fieldcrest trailed 21-20 in the opening set, but a block by Kaylin Rients put Kaitlyn White on the serving line. White served up four consecutive points, two on Tri-Valley errors and two coming on kills in the middle by Rients, to put the hosts up a set, only the 11th dropped by the Vikings all season.

“Winning the first set was obviously huge for us,” May said. “I think even though we came into tonight confident, it really showed all of us that we could play with them going into the second set. I also think adjusting to their tips later in the first set was a key, as well. They were doing a good job of finding the open spot, but we made adjustments and took that option away.”

The second set was back-and-forth until the final point, including being tied at 22, 23 and 24. From there, consecutive winning swings by Rients and then Allie Wiesenhofer on match point gave the Knights the title.

Wiesenhofer (eight digs, six points) and Rients each had seven kills in the second set and nine for the match, with White adding five to go along with 21 assists, six digs and seven points.

Tri-Valley’s Elizabeth Detweiler finished with a match-high 11 kills and two aces.

“We played Tri-Valley very early in the season. They were just unstoppable and playing at a much faster speed than we were,” Fieldcrest coach Cathy Sanders said. “In the conference tournament, we put ourselves in a big hole and just weren’t able to come back from it. But we talked a lot coming into tonight about after playing them twice. We know what they are going to try and do and how we needed to stop it.

“We started the match with a ton of energy, and you could just see the confidence grow with every point. Like the girls said, winning the first set was a huge uplift for us.

“Most matches, it comes down who makes the least number of errors, and we didn’t make too many tonight.”