Hartsburg-Emden wins Class 8-1A Regional Championship over West Lincoln Broadwell

[March 10, 2017]  Walking into the gym at Hartsburg on Thursday evening, one would swear 3,000 people were packed in the stands, all cheering and yelling for the home team. The crowd was by no means that large, but by the sound of it, they could rival a mob at an Elvis concert.

And at the center of it all, guiding the Stags to taking care of business, was Coach Jennifer Hayes. After the 25-9 and 25-17 wins she was, overheard in the huddle telling her undefeated 24-0 eighth grade team, “All right now, we’re taking care of business.”

It’s what her team does. The first game, those Stags were on fire and wasted no time jumping out to an 8-1 lead. The team had no problem building the lead up to 10-3 and then 13-6 behind some pretty monstrous kills from eighth grader Grace Beekman and sixth grader Lily Barry. Thanks here to longtime Hartsburg-Emden legend and Stags supporter Rudy Klokkenga for filling the reporter in on Lily Barry. The young lady is phenomenal. It’s worth repeating, she is a sixth-grader.

Before long Hartem was in charge 17-7 and the kills just kept coming. Brianna Grabowski chipped in as well here and in the blink of an eye the score was 20-8. No matter how hard Emily Paulus and Rachel Brackney were trying on the other side of the net for WL-B, Hartem just owned this one and cruised to the 25-9 win.

The second game was a bit closer to start, as the two teams literally exchanged blows, only on the court, and it wasn’t until Hartem pulled away 14-10 that WL-B’s Head Coach Kim Heitzig called timeout.

While Coach Heitzig was getting her team to regroup, Coach Hayes was getting her team to reload pretty much. Focus is a word that Coach Hayes likes to use a lot and her girls know what it means. They came out of the huddle ready for battle and no one showed a more fierce fire in her eyes than the young Barry girl.

Before long Hartem was leading 17-13. Then a second glance at the scoreboard and it was 22-16 in Hartem’s favor. Not that WL-B was giving up, but it’s just that Hartem was dominating.

There was one kill by Beekman that a college libero would not even have a chance returning. No return to sender on this ball. Hartem was just annihilating that poor volleyball.

The Stags shut down WL-B minutes later behind the bullet serves of Allison Woolard to finish the game 25-17 in favor of the orange and black “Taking care of business” crew.

A very happy Hartem crowd gathered around the group for pictures with the newest Class 8-1A Regional Championship plaque being held by Hattie Langley.

Following a slew of congratulations, Hartem Head Coach Jennifer Hayes could be found taking in the win and all the fun a celebration like this brings to the small community. “It’s been like 14 days since we’ve played together as a whole team,” she said. "Last night we played in the semifinals without Grace Beekman, she’s had the flu. So we just had to put it together and they got through it, they did fine. But tonight to put them all back together with the regular lineup, it looked sharp. They were ready to go. They were intense. Taking nothing away from West Lincoln, I know that they came in and played hard. I think we got them shook on the first game. They got on their heals. But they came back out in the second game and they made a lot less errors and made us play, which was good. We relaxed a little bit, which you saw. It’s hard, as a coach, it’s the number one thing to try to get a team that wins big the first game to turn around and do the same thing in the second game. That’s tough, but they took care of it. They did what they were supposed to do and I thought they looked sharp doing it. They are ready for Monday.”

Monday night Hartsburg will host the sectional championship game. The host Stags (24-0) will take on Metamora St. Mary’s (16-6) with the first serve scheduled for 6:30 p.m. St. Mary’s defeated Normal Calvary 25-23 and 25-7 to punch their ticket to the date with Hartem.

Meanwhile WL-B’s date with Hartem didn’t work out the way Lady Wolverine fans would have liked, but WL-B Head Coach Kim Heitzig knew what they were up against, noting that the Hartem program is “just top notch and undefeated the last two years.”

Class 8-1A Regional Volleyball Champions

"Hartsburg is just an awesome program,” Coach Heitzig stated. Any time we come in here it’s going to be a tough fight. But one of these days…” her voice trailed off with a laugh.

Despite the season-ending loss, Coach Heitzig was very proud of her team’s success. "Overall they worked really hard as a team as a whole. They came in everyday to practice. They have a long basketball season and they fought illness, holidays, and they practice late for me. So they are very dedicated and actually they are true athletes. They want to win and they want to work hard. I am gonna miss them. All those eighth graders, I am gonna miss them, a good team.” WL-B finished the season with a respectable 16-5 record. Eighth graders moving on to high school next season are Rachel Brackney, Karissa Bowman, Emily Paulus, Abbie Oliver, Madison Orebaugh, Hannah Horath and Makayla Anderson.

WL-B stats

Emily Paulus 8 kills
Rachel Brackney 2 kills
Karissa Bowman 10 assists

Hartem stats

Lily Barry 4 kills 1 dig 1 block
Grace Beekman 12 kills 5 digs 4 blocks
Brianna Grabowski 5 kills 4 aces
Jaedyn Rybolt 9 assists
Allison Woolard 7 assists


That's a win! The Hartem Stags taking care of business by winning yet another regional championship!

All hands on the plaque!

Coach Jennifer Hayes takes a moment to praise her team following the regional championship over WLB.

WLB ends the season 16-5

From Hattie Langley’s mom Britta following the Hartem win: “Emily Paulus, who plays for WL-B, is one of Hattie’s best friends, so it’s hard when you play to win against friends. It made me cry after the game to see Emily crying and then when she hugged Hattie she said, “You better win state.” Now that is a true friend and shows GREAT sportsmanship.”

[Teena Lowery]