Mater Dei has to settle for 2nd in state volleyball
Try as she did, Mater Dei outside hitter Brooke Schulte couldn’t help her team win the school’s sixth state volleyball championship Saturday night.
Instead, Wisconsin-bound outside hitter Annemarie Hickey recorded a match-high 13 kills and added 11 digs as Joliet Catholic won back-to-back state championships with a 25-20, 25-23 victory over the Knights in the Illinois Class 3A state tournament at Redbird Arena.
Schulte, a sophomore, had a team-best 10 kills and nine digs, but was outgunned by the talented Hickey, who will head to Wisconsin as a defensive specialist.
“Their defense was all over the place,” said Schulte, who would have had more kills had it not been for Hickey, Katie Schoenstedt (8) and Stephanie Keca (7), who combined for 24 of the team’s 45 digs.
“They picked up almost every ball. They just played it all the way out. They just picked up some amazing balls we thought were gone and they just picked (them) up.”
The match looked like it might go three games because Mater Dei, winning a second-place trophy for the first time, seemed to be rolling with a 15-10 advantage in game two after a Schulte kill. But Joliet began a 10-1 scoring surge thanks to three straight unforced errors by the Knights, who had 10 in game two and 18 overall. Hickey followed with a kill before another Mater Dei error tied it at 15-15. Hickey put her team in front 16-15 with another kill forcing head coach Fred Rakers to call timeout.
“We were thinking about (a timeout) at 13 or 14,” said the 64-year-old Rakers, who has been the Knights head coach for 34 years. “Over the years, you just say one more and you’re going to get the ball back. You hope. I’ve always treated those timeouts like gold. It’s hard to change an old man at the end of the stream.”
Mater Dei’s Alison Mueller tied it at 16-16 with a kill (she ended with two for the night). But another kill by Hickey, two service aces by Hickey and a kill by Claire Randich gave the Angels a 20-16 margin. The Knights cut the deficit to 24-23 on an attack error by Hickey. Hickey, though, started a wild celebration by her teammates when she hammered home the match winner with her final kill as a high school player.
“I wanted the last point, but everybody does,” Hickey said. “I was just screaming 12, 12 to (setter) Jen (Jennifer Murphy, who had 22 assists). I had confidence that Jen was going to set me. If she was going to set me, I knew I had to put the ball away for our team.”
Rakers felt his team went as far as they could go this season, but fell short of winning the school’s sixth championship. He has five titles, one second-place trophy, four third-place finishes and three fourth-place finishes in 19 state appearances.
“There’s only a little bit further we could get,” he said. “We really went somewhere. I think the girls really did a great job.”
