Norse volleyball sweeps Cardinals, 3-0

VIRGINIA—Less than a month ago, the two local rivals met up on the volleyball court for a tight, four-set battle where each set could’ve gone either way.

Tuesday night, Minnesota North-Mesabi Range and Minnesota North-Hibbing met up for the rematch and it was an entirely different story. The Cardinals were out of sorts from the beginning and the Norse jumped on the opportunity given to them as they cruised to the 3-0 (25-10, 25-16, 25-15) victory at William Wirtanen Gymnasium.

Sitting one spot out of the final MCAC North playoff spot heading into the evening, every game is a must-win for Mesabi Range if they hope to crack into the top four. For head coach Sara Matuszak, keeping her team at a high level and avoiding the lows that can take a team out of the game are what’s important to the Norse right now.

“We tried to keep our level up all night and that’s been one of our goals,” Matuszak said. “We had been on a losing streak and now we’re on a four-game winning streak. My focus in practice and on the court has been to maintain a level where we’re not super high but also not super low. Right now we’re trying to stay up. When we make an error, we have to let it go and don’t get in our heads. We’re in these must-win situations now if we want to make the playoffs so we need to stay up and go into the weekend with some confidence.”

For the Cardinals, it was easy to see the loss coming from a mile away. After a slow start in the first set, Hibbing couldn’t muster up a big enough response to avoid the sweep. Head coach Travis Vake gave credit to the Norse, but said his team ultimately beat themselves.

“We’re a much better team than we showed tonight,” Vake said. “But it feels like the same story, different day for us. The first game we had 17 errors so we didn’t get beat, we beat ourselves. Until we embrace that and try to fix it, it’s going to continue to happen.

“Mesabi, credit to them, made us work for it and we couldn’t do it. It’s a common theme for us and it felt like one of those nights where I had to ask ‘do we care?’ Some of the mistakes we’re making are elementary mistakes that we shouldn’t be making at this point in the season. We should be on a track upward instead of downward. So kudos to Sara and Mesabi but we just beat ourselves tonight and it’s unfortunate we couldn’t give them a better match.”

The Norse got on the board to start the first set with a kill from Katie Peck and an ace serve from Aiesah Benner. Hibbing’s first hitting error made it 3-0 while another Benner ace made it 4-0. The Cardinals closed the gap early with kills from Madeline Kallberg and Kallie Richards, but a new threat from Mesabi Range in the form of Hannah Edwards in the middle shifted things back in their favor.

Edwards, playing her fourth match now in the middle for the Norse, grabbed an early kill and—after a Peck kill—won a tip battle at the net to make it 8-3. The teams started to trade points but Hibbing’s chances at rallying never went anywhere due to a high number of serves that went straight into the net.

After a point and a kill from the Norse’s Ashley Dahl, as well as two Cardinals hitting errors, Vake took a timeout with his team trailing 15-6.

The break didn’t do much to get Hibbing to snap out of their funk as Mesabi Range continued to stretch the lead, eventually ending the set with a Peck kill, 25-10. With so much holding his team back in the first set, Vake said the serving mistakes were especially frustrating this time around.

“There are certain aspects of volleyball that you can independently control and your serve is one of them. When you serve eight or 10 balls into the net time after time, then it’s a big problem. I can’t control that for them. We’ve been preaching how important it is to minimize our own errors and until we do that, we’re going to be playing a lot of defense. We have to transition and find a way to play offense. We have flashes here and there but then we stall and it’s back to the errors.

“I know it’s frustrating for these girls and it’s frustrating to us coaches but we have to fix it somehow. If we can’t, it’s going to be a long rest of the season.”

Dominating that first set, Matuszak said her team was able to set the tone early and remained in control throughout. Hibbing’s miscues contributed to that control as well.

“We served well tonight and Hibbing had some hitting and serving errors in the first set and that’s just how volleyball is sometimes. That first set really, I think, set how things were going to go. They had the errors and some things go against them and they just never really got over that. We had our own errors definitely but we controlled it for the most part. It was hard for [Hibbing] to pull themselves back up after that.”

The second set was competitive early on with the Cardinals finding Richards often. The Norse had answers from Dahl and Edwards, but Hibbing kept things close halfway through, 12-12. A tip point from Benner followed by an ace of her own gave Mesabi Range the lead, however, and the Cardinals began to fall apart once more.

Hibbing serves started going into the net and their hitting attempts often sailed long out of bounds. Conversely, the Norse offense felt like a well-oiled machine and the Cardinals couldn’t put up a strong enough block or dig their way out of the hits.

After things were tied 12-12, Mesabi Range took 13 of the next 17 points to sprint to the end of the set, 25-16. In the third set, they remained in control from start to finish and held a lead of five or more continuously once they were up 13-8.

Looking at the successes on the night, Matuszak praised the play of Edwards in the middle—a spot she’s familiar with from her high school days.

“That’s been the place we’ve struggled a bit this season and she’s new to our lineup in that spot. She’s definitely been a big help for us there. Having here there has really helped get our offense going. It’s been nice to have that productivity there.”

Some time removed from the injury of sophomore blocker Allie Bittmann, the Norse have grown accustomed to their newly created lineup. While the hope is for Bittmann to return soon, Matuszak says the team has made progress in her absence.

“That changed things for us and not having Allie really hurts our blocking as a defensive strength. When we don’t have her, we’re more focused on digging so we’re not going to get that real big block. But girls like Gabby Lira, Suzu Aubrey and our middles have been doing a better job of at least getting a hand on the ball without Allie so we’ll keep working that until she’s back in the lineup. We’re hoping she’ll be back soon.”

For Vake and the Cardinals, the disappointing and uncompetitive nature of Tuesday’s loss stung a bit harder than normal. Vake hopes his players can find a way to snap out of the funk they’re in.

“They have to take care of it [off the court]. It starts first with them independently and their heart and that’s what I talked to them after the match about. You need to look in the mirror and decide if you have the heart and decide if you want to be here. I need six players who want to be here and who will give me their all and work their butt off on the court.

“Until I find those six that want to embrace it, it’s a practice issue. At practice we emphasize effort but when we get on the court suddenly we don’t know what we’re doing. I challenged the girls to figure out if it’s something that’s fixable for us. Right now, I can’t teach effort.”

Heading into the weekend, Mesabi Range is set to travel to Alexandria Tech on Friday and Northland on Friday. For Matuszak, the Norse are in what she calls “must-win” territory.

“We need to win at least one of those if we want to keep our playoff hopes alive so it’s going to be a big challenge for us. We’re trying to build and keep our level high but not too high so we don’t come crashing down. We need to stay confident, forget about our mistakes quickly and move on to the next point.

“It’s easy in volleyball to make a mistake and then lose some trust and momentum so really we need to believe in each other, stay positive and just keep moving while trying to stay up.”

HIGH SCHOOL

VOLLEYBALL

North Woods 3,

McGregor 0

COOK—The North Woods volleyball team cruised to a 3-0 (25-4, 25-10, 25-13) sweep over the Mercuries on Tuesday.

No further information was provided to the Mesabi Tribune.

The Grizzlies travel to Northeast Range on Thursday.

Chisholm 3,

Mesabi East 0

AURORA—The Chisholm volleyball team went into hostile territory on Tuesday and picked up a 3-0 (25-16, 25-22, 26-24) sweep over Mesabi East.

Marta Forsline led the Giants on the night with nine kills to go with three blocks. Greta Levelwind led in aces with two while Reese Heikkila led in digs with 16. Levelwind added 11 digs. While Grace Paul had eight. Lainey Rost finished with 14 set assists.

Statistics for the Bluestreaks were not made available to the Mesabi Tribune.

Mesabi East is set to host Greenway on Thursday while Chisholm hosts Deer River that same night.

Ely 3,

Duluth Marshall 0

DULUTH—The Ely volleyball team faced little resistance from Duluth Marshall on Tuesday night as the Timberwolves cruised by the Hilltoppers 3-0 (25-8, 25-22, 25-13).

Lilli Rechichi led Ely in kills with 11 while Charlotte Hegman added 10. Rechichi also led in blocks with four and digs with 11. Gretta Lowe commanded the floor with 32 set assists. She added 10 digs. Hegman and Audrey Kallberg finished with five aces each.

Class A Showcase

The Ely volleyball team went 2-3 over the weekend at the Class A Showcase in Burnsville.

The Timberwolves started the weekend with a loss to Russell-Tyler-Ruthton 22-25, 19-25 and ended the day Friday with a loss to Minneota (16-25, 20-25).

On Saturday, Ely evened up their record with wins over Bethlehem Academy (25-23, 25-20) and Fillmore Central (25-18, 26-28, 15-9) but closed out the tournament with a loss to Spring Grove (25-23, 25-17).

Ely returns to play Monday when they travel to Northeast Range.

GIRLS’ TENNIS

Rock Ridge 6,

Duluth East 1

VIRGINIA—The Rock Ridge girls’ tennis team used a singles sweep to guide their victory on Tuesday as they downed Duluth East 6-1.

In singles, the Wolverines picked up wins from Mayme Scott, Allie Fink, Ellie Dimberio and Alice Johnson (all in straight sets).

In doubles, the duo of Ayla Troutwine and Nina Paulsen as well as Mattelyn Seppi and Emmi Peterson also picked up wins for Rock Ridge.

The Wolverines are back in action on Thursday when they host Grand Rapids.

Rock Ridge 6, Duluth East 1

Singles: No. 1 Mayme Scott, RR, def. Cedar Fischer 6-0, 6-1; No. 2 Alli Fink, RR, def. Nora Good 6-0, 6-1; No. 3 Ellie Dimberio, RR, def. Louisa Hill 6-0, 6-0; No. 4 Alice Johnson, RR, def. Alexa Gunderson 7-5, 6-1.

Doubles: No. 1 Ayla Troutwine/Nina Paulsen, Rr, def. Christina Duncan/Harriet Hill 6-1, 4-6, [10-8]; No. 2 Mattelyn Seppi/Emmi Peterson, RR, def. Aleta Kimbor/Caddy Fischer 6-1, 6-1; No. 3 Romie Gange/Mae McCall, DE, def. Ava Dahl/Erin Troutwhine 6-1, 6-3.