Far left: No. 12 Linden Sutton is only a ninth grader but she has been a bright spot for a very good Viking volleyball team. Here she sets the ball for one of her teammates. Above: Taylor Ryden bumped the ball to the front line in the game against Cromwell. It was an exciting match throughout and Taylor’s fine play was one reason the Vikings emerged victors in the match. Left: Lexi Palmer has become one of the better Vikings at serving. Palmer’s serves are hard and the ball is hard for the defense to return.
Two days after the Cook County High School girls’ volleyball played their best volleyball of the year when they beat the McGregor Mercuries in a thrilling five-set match, they had to get on the bus and travel to Cromwell, another tough match, and see if they could summon up another great performance. Turns out they could and did.
Cromwell challenges Vikings
The first game was as tight as it could be with the Vikings needing to extend the game to win by two points, 27-25. Cromwell pounded the Vikings 25-15 to win game two in what Head Coach Pam Taylor said was an aberration. “We didn’t talk on the floor in game two. We just got off our game plan, but the girls came back and played really well in the last two games.”
They needed to play well, because Cromwell gave them everything they had. The Vikings won game three in a squeaker 25-23 and won game four 25-16 to take the best of five match 3-1.
Once again Ali Iverson paced the Vikings with 20 set assists, 6 kills, 9 digs, 3 blocks and 5 aces. Theresa Morrin had 8 set assists, 3 kills and 8 digs while Anna Carman finished the night with 21 digs from the back row.
Ninth-grader Linden Sutton was huge at the net with 14 kills and both Jessica Berg-Collman and Abbey Sutton had 46 ball handling attempts, which meant most of the plays came through them. Abbey also had 5 kills, 13 digs and 9 assists while Jessica had 8 set assists and 8 digs. Sarah Deschampe had 13 digs and 10 set assists and Taylor Ryden had 7 set assists and 12 digs. Stephanie Lashinski had 1 kill and 2 digs and Megan Lehto had 4 digs and continues to be a force with her serving.
Vikings polish Agates in three games
The Vikings played their last regular season game of the year on Tuesday night, October 16 in front of a large home crowd when they took on North Shore rival Two Harbors.
It was a good tune-up for the Vikings who will enter the playoffs with a good seed because of their 14-5 won loss record.
It was also a good chance to let players who practice hard but don’t always get to play much have some time on the floor.
The first game was close for a while, 6-5 in favor of the Vikings who had some nerves early. However, once they calmed down they rocketed away from their opponents and won 25-13.
During that game Lexi Palmer had some great serve points. Ali Iverson contributed some wicked spikes and Theresa Morrin once again served some hard-to-return balls. The back line cleaned up pretty much everything the Agates could throw at them and the front line was efficient, with even the shortest Vikings going up high and sending the ball back over the net for points.
Game two was a perfect mirror of game one, with the Vikings winning 25-13. Even the scores were almost identical throughout the two contests as the games were played. Big plays were made by Abbey Sutton, Linden Sutton and Anna Carman. Sarah Deschampe and Jessica Berg-Collman had strong games digging and bumping the ball to the front line.
Game three was close with the Vikings playing many backups throughout the contest. Coach Taylor let her second team play much of the game, and only inserted starters back in near the end to secure a 25-21 win.
For the game Ali Iverson and Theresa Morrin each had 5 kills and Abbey Sutton and Jessica Berg-Collman had 9 and 8 set assists to lead the team to an easy victory.
Playoffs will start next week with the first game on Wednesday, Oct. 24 starting at 7 p.m. As of press time it is not yet known who the Vikings will face.
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