WINDOM - The sting of a loss that happened more than one year ago was all the motivation Windom Area needed Thursday.
When the Eagles met up with Pipestone Area on Sept. 4, 2014, they won the first two sets only to see the Arrows come back and hand them a heartbreaking loss in five. They were determined to not let that happen again.
“I think we were just really focused tonight,” said Windom Area senior setter Lauren Huset. “Last year against them we took a really tough loss. I think because of last year… that made this so much bigger. I feel like we took a big step forward.”
In the 2015 meeting of the Big South Conference rivals, the Eagles won the first two sets 25-16 and 25-13. There would be no comeback this time when they closed it out with a 25-12 triumph in the third.
Windom Area head coach Ron Wendorff echoed some of Huset’s thoughts on the contest.
“We came out very focused,” he said. “We try to get ready and start strong. Tonight I was pleased with our effort in all three sets. We find that sometimes when we win the first set we don’t focus as well in the second. We did tonight.”
Early on it was all Windom Area. Porsha Porath put together a long service run and Becca Hacker provided a formidable defensive front, stuffing a handful of Arrow attacks. The Eagles went up by as much as 11 at 15-4, but the visitors wouldn’t go away.
Back-to-back kills by Maddie Kennedy and Kiaya Alderson got Pipestone Area within striking distance before Anneke Bucher dropped in two straight service aces. An ace block by Tarryn Woelber cut the Eagles’ lead to 18-14 and forced them into their first timeout.
“We relaxed more during that stretch than we did all night,” said Pipestone Area head coach Jamie Juhl of her team’s run. “We played how we normally play for a little bit, but we just weren’t mentally here tonight.”
During the timeout, the Eagles got things straightened out. Four straight points by Madison Maras were followed by a Porath kill that sealed a 25-16 Windom Area victory.
“At that point we were just having some problems with miscommunication on serve receive,” Wendorff said. “That’s something that will happen once in a while; you just hope it doesn’t happen two or three times in a row. We just made it clear to them that they needed to talk and figure out who was going to go after it. Right after that I think it was Madison Maras who stepped up and made a nice pass. Once we got that done, we did a nice job playing together.”
The two squads traded points early in the second, with neither going up by more than one until it was 11-9 Windom Area. That all changed when Huset took the service line and led the Eagles on an 8-0 run. The highlight of that surge was when Porath lowered the boom on a free ball to extend her team’s lead to six.
Alderson finally stopped the bleeding with a kill, but the Eagles were still able to close out a 25-13 victory on a tandem block by Katie Kelly and Maras.
Huset, who finished with 20 set assists and five digs to go with a 12-for-13 serving night, was quick to praise her team’s success on serve receive. In the second set, that was particularly noticeable. Of the 11 serves the Eagles took, they made perfect passes on eight of them and good passes on two more, according to Wendorff.
“When the ball is right on my head I can easily go to all three of my hitters,” Huset said. “The blockers don’t know where it will be.”
Shelby Bloemendaal and Alderson did their best to keep the Arrows in it at the outset of the third set. But the hard-hitting attackers of Windom Area wouldn’t be denied. Set up by Huset, they helped Morgan Hockel turn an 8-7 lead into one of 14-7.
Back-to-back blocks by Porath got the Eagles out to a nice lead before Kelly took to the service line up 18-11. She didn’t give it back until a Bloemendaal kill at 23-12. A Sydnee Broberg ace ended it at 25-12 Eagles.
Maras finished the night 20-for-20 at the service line with two aces and four kills. Kelly was also perfect and had two aces. Porath led the team with 16 kills to go with four solo blocks and two block assists. Hacker had two solo blocks and five kills with Broberg leading the team in digs with six.
Windom Area (4-1 overall, 2-0 Big South) is off until Thursday when it travels to Redwood Valley. The Arrows (3-1 overall, 0-1 Big South) will try to get back on track Saturday at a tournament in Luverne.
“I think we’ve really built on our performance this week,” Wendorff said. “But it’s still early and we’ve got to continue to grow.”
