Jared Schmeltzer
Reporter
The Merrill volleyball team took on Eau Claire North last night in a non conference match up. The game would go all five sets with the Bluejays eventually taking the hard earned win.
Merrill got off to a good start after winning a tight first set 25-23. The Bluejays went on to take the second set with more of a cushion with a 25-14 win. In the third set Eau Claire North showed they wouldn’t be pushed around with a 25-16 win. Eau Claire also went on to take the fourth set 25-20 to force a fifth set. The Merrill girls showed up big in the final set and took home the victory with a 15-6 win.
“This was just the match that we needed going into Thursdays conference match up against SPASH.” Said head coach Kris Krug. “We finally showed some much needed intensity in set 5. I felt like we were just going through the motions in sets 3 and 4. Eau Claire North is an aggressive serving team and very scrappy. We served very well tonight – 5 players at 100%, but had more hitting errors than I care to think about. On to a tough match on Thursday night!”
The five girls who served 100% include Maddix Bonnell (25 attempts), Kate Peterson (10 attempts), Kelsie Belfiori (13 attempts), Madi Weix (11 attempts), and Lindsey Casper (24 attempts). Megan Schroder led the team in kills in the game with 16 and four errors. Morgan Wardall was second in kills with 12, however Wardall had an unusual 11 errors in the game.
Merrill levels Lumberjacks
On Thursday night Merrill volleyball took on Wausau East in a conference match up at home. The Bluejays came out victorious beating the Lumberjacks in four sets.
“It was a long week of homecoming activities, so I was happy to be able to get everyone into the match and to end the night with a victory,” comments coach Kris Krug.
Merrill dominated the first set winning 25-12. The second set was a breeze as well for the girls as they won by a score of 25-8. In the third set the girls had some trouble and ended up losing 18-25 but were able to bounce back in the fourth set to win the game 25-8.
“We had another night of aggressive serving with Morgan Wardall serving 16 serves in a row and throwing in seven ace serves!” said coach Krug. “Kelsie Belfiori had a stellar night serving as well with 17 total attempts and four aces. She served 100% tonight! Three other players contributed with 100% serving – Eve Akey, Maddix Bonnell and Madi Weix. The underclassmen racked up some big kills tonight as well with Kaylee Bowe at seven kills, Liz Iribarren had seven kills, and Megan Schroder putting down eight kills!”
The girls currently sit with a 24-5 record on the year and will be looking to improve that on Thursday night when they travel to Stevens Point to take on SPASH.