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Let the postseason begin. Oh, I know that the postseason began
last Wednesday. I know it continued on Saturday night. But as those
of us who are avid watchers of high school volleyball and fans of
the Lady Railers know, the postseason challenge actually begins
Tuesday night.
But first things first.
Congratulations to the Lincoln Lady Railers on their 2006
regional championship! The Railers earned another regional trophy by
virtue of their victory over the Generals of Decatur MacArthur by a
match score of 25-19, 25-14. Lincoln had previously dominated
Decatur Eisenhower in Wednesday night's semifinal match at LCHS by a
match score of 25-10, 25-9.
In Saturday night's regional final the Lady Railers made it
harder than it should have been based upon the large difference in
volleyball talent between the two teams. There was very little
chance that the Generals would beat the Railers, so long as the
Railers didn't beat themselves. In both games Lincoln ran out to
quick leads early on, had a midgame letdown and then finished well
enough to win.
In game one, for instance, the Railers were up 10-2, 14-5 and
even 16-7 to begin the night's action. At 16-7, the Railers began to
unravel. Several Railer errors on defense, in setting and at the net
caused Lincoln's nine-point lead to shrink to a three-point lead. At
18-15, Lincoln's coach Howe requested a one-minute meeting with her
team. The conversation took a few minutes to sink in. The two teams
continued to go back and forth until a Jamie McFadden kill put the
Railers up 21-19. After that, Decatur errors were enough to take the
Railers to victory, as Lincoln finished the last four consecutive
points to win 25-19.
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Game two was almost a mirror image of game one, with a smaller
Railer letdown in the middle. The Railers once again jumped out to
leads of 8-3 and 12-5. Most of the Decatur points were garnered
through Railer errors. Most of the Railer points were likewise
obtained by Decatur errors. At 12-5, the midgame lapse hit the
Railers. The Generals were able to close the scoring gap to 13-10.
But that was as close as Decatur would get, as Jamie McFadden and
Ashley Meyrick controlled the net from that point. That net play,
along with a six-point service run by Samantha Lowman, ran the score
to 21-10. The end followed quickly at 25-14 with a soft tip by
Natalie Boward into an opening on the Decatur side of the floor.
The Lady Railers move on to play Bloomington High School in the
sectional semifinal that will be played Tuesday night at Normal
Community High School. Lincoln will play in the night's second
match, which starts at approximately 7:30. The first match of the
evening will be at 6:30 between Normal Community and Normal
University.
The sectional seeds have held firm so far, with the top four
seeds having made it to the semifinals. The Lady Railers will be
looking to upset the No. 2 seed, so that they can move on to
Thursday night's sectional final match.
Just a reminder to the Lady Railers that Bloomington's coach has
already predicted that you will lose and his team will win on
Tuesday. In a Pantagraph article a few weeks ago, BHS coach Joe
Sanders predicted that his team and Normal Community would meet for
the sectional championship match.
So, ladies, is there any reason to even play the match on
Tuesday, or should we just let BHS call in the result they
predicted? How about if you go ahead and play it just for fun and
see what happens! It's one-and-done time, ladies! It's up to you
(not the BHS coach) how far you go. GO, RAILERS!
[Article and picture by Rick L. Hobler]
Respond to the writer at
rhobler@lccs.edu.
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