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Rosary concludes grueling stretch with tourney title
Updated: September 24, 2011 9:13PM
Rosary junior Brianna Flagg clutched the big green and gold trophy to her chest and wouldn’t let it go, leaving the Waubonsie Valley gym with it still nestled into the gray fleece sweatshirt covering her sweaty jersey.
After playing 15 games in 14 days, a little crazed infatuation is understandable.
The Royals beat Neuqua Valley and Batavia on Saturday morning before ousting Downers Grove North in the championship 25-19, 25-22 to win the Warrior Blast Tournament undefeated.
“It will probably be in my bed tonight,” said a smiling Flagg while holding her new prize. “It feels so good. Fifteen matches in 14 days has been so stressful. Our team has been up and down.
“It’s nice to end our long streak of matches with a win.”
Flagg played a huge role as Rosary (17-7) pounded Batavia 25-13, 25-16. She finished with four kills and an ace in the championship match.
“Besides St. Francis, it was the best serving performance we’d seen out of a team,” said Bulldogs coach Lori Tripp-Payne, whose team beat Rosary last weekend before losing twice this weekend.
“We’re usually the tougher serving team and we got the other end of it.”
The Bulldogs finished fourth out of 12 teams, dropping the third-place match in three games to St. Ignatius. Batavia (14-10) had a strong win early in the morning against Waubonsie, jumping out to a 17-3 lead in the first game to win 25-11, 25-23.
“I don’t even think we were awake,” Warriors coach Kristen Stuart said. “I’ve never seen us make that many mistakes. … It was just hard to come back after a couple losses and focus, I guess, but they still had that goal to win. It just didn’t work out.”
Waubonsie (13-10) finished in eighth place, also losing to Neuqua and Lincoln-Way North.
Lisa Studnicka led the Warriors with 44 kills and 35 digs over five games, while libero Lauren Clarke had 88 digs.
“I feel like we have a lot of energy, but we’re just not putting balls away,” Clarke said. “Our serve-receive was solid, but no one was putting balls away because they were scared and timid. Yesterday, we were solid.
“Our blocking was working. Today, when one thing was working, another wasn’t. If passing was good, blocking wasn’t good.”
Oswego’s struggles continued throughout the tournament, dropping two games Saturday to Plainfield Central and Bolingbrook, the latter a team it had beaten in two sets Friday. Anna Matic had 29 digs for the Panthers on Saturday.
Rosary picked up a championship performance from Amelia Wegman, who will be making an official visit to the University of Houston on Monday.
Wegman had 10 kills against the Trojans, punctuated by a kill to win the match moments after missing an opportunity while a bit flat-footed.
“When you’re around game point it’s ‘OK, this ball has gotta go down,’” Wegman said. “When I didn’t hit it down the one time, I said if I got another chance it was going down.”
Rosary’s tournament win was the first for the school since a victory at Plainfield North last year.
“I’m thrilled,” Rosary coach Lisa Kasper said. “It was a long week. Last week was very disappointing. We had a disappointing loss to St. Francis and a disappointing loss to Batavia.
“We struggled at the Wheaton (South) tournament. A lot of tears at the end of the week so for them to come back this week and go 7-0, I’m so happy.”
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