Familiar faces to square off at Downers South

Updated: April 25, 2011 6:22AM

With six West Suburban Conference teams in the field at Downers Grove South, there will be plenty of familiar faces playing against each other at this weekend's Mustangs Invitational.

Lyons has already lost its first conference match of the season to Downers North, which is in the field of 24 competing in three different campus sites starting Thursday.

Lyons, Oak Park-River Forest and Hinsdale South enter the tournament with winning records, but Lyons is the team out of the three perhaps more desperate for some wins. Lyons won five of six matches to open the season, but enters this week with three losses in its last four matches. Lyons defeated host Hinsdale South 22-25, 25-17, 25-22 on April 14.

"This is definitely one of our biggest tournaments of the season," said 6-foot-5 senior Mark Hogan, one of Lyons' kills leaders. "Coach (Joann Pyritz) always highlights the teams in the tournament that we could be seeing later."

Two of Lyons' losses during a three-match losing streak earlier this month came against the two Downers Grove schools. Both will compete in the Downers South Invitational after South defeated North to win the Schaumburg Invitational Saturday.

"We're mixing up positions to find out who fits in best," Hogan said. "My job is getting the most kills, but we're mixing it up a little bit. We're trying to work through things."

After the Downers South Invitational, Lyons resumes play in the West Suburban Silver by playing at Glenbard West April 26. Lyons already owns a conference win over Proviso West.

"I think we're fortunate to be 6-4," Hogan said.

The pairings for the Downers South Invitational will be released Wednesday on the team's Website. The first round will be played Thursday due to the Good Friday holiday.

Hinsdale South's tallest player is its setter, 6-4 senior Eric Damon, but the Hornets (8-5) have already come out of tournaments at Argo and St. Charles East with a combined 7-2 record. Hinsdale South defeated rival Hinsdale Central to take third place in St. Charles.

"It's been a lot of fun. Last season, we wanted to make it worthwhile, but we get along better with this team than last year," said Damon, who was named all-tournament at Argo along with teammate Ray Riordan.

Riordan, Eric Kluge and Robbie Mead have been Damon's favorite targets on offense this season. Damon, who in his second varsity season, also played club in the offseason for Lisle-based Illinois Performance Volleyball with Hornets teammate James Wood.

"I remember last year there were a ton of top teams from state there [at Downers South]," Damon said. "We can compare and see how much we've improved."

One of the hottest teams entering the Mustangs Invitational is OPRF, which enters the week with five consecutive wins. The streak started with a 25-11, 22-25, 25-9 win April 4 over Young, which eliminated the Huskies (12-5) from last year's playoffs.

"[At Downers South], we have not done too well in the past," OPRF senior outside hitter Ben Wilks said. "Last year, we did all right. Hopefully we'll do better this year."

The Huskies won seven consecutive matches earlier this year, which ended on the second day of the Tiger Classic April 2 at Wheaton Warrenville South. Senior libero Mike Fredrick was named all-tournament at the Tiger Classic, where OPRF finished eighth.

"I think we're just better as a team," Wilks said. "We're bringing a lot to practice, just on team building [exercises] have definitely helped us."

All three teams will be looking for quality wins at Downers South. The deadline to determine seeding for the sectional is May 5.

© 2012 Sun-Times Media, LLC. All rights reserved. This material may not be copied or distributed without permission. For more information about reprints and permissions, visit www.suntimesreprints.com. To order a reprint of this article, click here.