There was a major difference between the Huntley team that played over the weekend and the Red Raiders that took the court Tuesday against Dundee-Crown.
“Communication is so little but it means so much to the game,” Huntley setter Kelsey DeWulf said. “Nobody wants to be the one who makes the error, so it’s hard, but now there are players looking toward each other and saying ‘set me the ball, I’ll put it down’. We were talking more today.”
The Red Raiders chattered their way to an impressive 25-13 win in game one of the FVC Valley game, and then withstood a late surge to win 25-18 over the Chargers.
DeWulf had 16 assists for Huntley (17-10, 4-4), which used its improved communication skills to shine in another area of play in the night’s opening game.
“We played really well. We only had three unforced errors,” Huntley coach Karen Naymola said. “That was the difference between the two games. In game one we did a good job of minimizing our errors.”
The Red Raiders grabbed the throttle early in game one, running out to a 16-8 lead and never allowing Dundee-Crown (14-8, 3-5) to threaten down the stretch.
Game two saw Huntley take a 14-7 lead before the Chargers clawed back on a five-point run, with Bre Novak holding serve.
A kill from the Chargers’ Kailey Moll cut the Raiders’ lead to 15-14, but Huntley posted a 10-4 scoring edge from there to close out the game.
“I’m proud of the way they came back and fought in the second game,” Dundee-Crown coach Christine Hopkins-Muehl said. “But again, we’ve been struggling with our focus and our belief in our game a little bit. I told them it’s not a question of ‘can we win?’. It’s ‘will we win?’. We’re struggling a little with that.”
Frankie Cavallaro had 13 assists for the Chargers, while Novak had seven kills and Gina Pagano had seven digs.
Erin Erb led Huntley with 10 kills, Alyson Dion had eight, and Haley Arnieri had 11 digs.
“Our hitters are putting the ball away for us and I have to credit our freshman, Aleah (Amelio),” Naymola said. “She’s been doing a great job on her block, getting good touches that we can play defense on. Earlier in the year we had to improve on our blocking and her block has improved. She’s helping us tremendously on defense.”
