Edwardsville overpowers Neuqua Valley

Updated: May 31, 2011 10:35PM

BELLEVILLE — Edwardsville boys volleyball has matured from infant to a toddler of age 3.

And Tuesday night, the Tigers grew into one of the big boys.

Edwardsville overcame a dominant start by Neuqua Valley to pull out a 19-25, 29-27, 25-21 victory over the Wildcats in the championship match of the Belleville West Sectional.

“Three years ago when we were just starting, we could barely hit the ball over the net,” said Tigers senior Eric Fitterer, who threw down a match-high 17 kills. “And now we’re going to be competing with the best teams in the state. That feels really good.”

Edwardsville improves to 25-1 while extending its winning streak to 24 straight. The Tigers will Vernon Hills (35-4) in the quarterfinals of the State Finals at 2 p.m. Friday at Hoffman Estates.

Neuqua Valley, seeking its fourth state tourney trip in five years after placing third three times in succession form 2007-09, bows out at 31-7.

“First, I want to congratulate Edwardsville, they played a great match,” Wildcats coach Erich Mendoza said. “They won, I hope they do well at state. It’s cool for them to get that experience to go up there.”

When Neuqua Valley broke to a 21-12 lead in the first set, the Tigers appeared to go the way of other Southern Illinois teams overmatched in their first exposure to a more seasoned postseason foe from suburban Chicago.

The Wildcats would need less than 15 minutes to secure a 25-19 victory in Game 1, but the Tigers grew some confidence in that defeat.

“With those last few points that we got in the first game, we knew they weren’t invincible and that we could make points,” said Fitterer, a 6-foot-7 right side who has signed with Lewis University. “And we did that.”

Neuqua Valley would erase a 10-4 deficit in the second set to take a 24-22 lead that had the contingent of about 20 Wildcats fans prepping for the four-plus hours drive back to Naperville. But match point never came for the Wildcats.

“We couldn’t get that last point, just couldn’t put one away,” Mendoza said. “That’s the toughest thing. I’m sure that’s going to dwell on these guys’ mind, that they had a shot at it.”

Jon Storm had 16 kills to lead the Wildcats, who got nine kills apiece from Jake Gerald and Conner Dart. Alex Blackwell finished with 32 assists for the Wildcats.

© 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.