Wolves sweep Wildcats to advance

The IKM-Manning Wolves volleyball team faced a tough challenge with the Woodbury Central Wildcats on the road Monday in the Class 1A Region 7 First Round Regional Game, but got the job done winning 25-22, 26-24, and 25-18.

“I’m really excited and the girls are really excited about it,” said Wolves Head Coach McKaylie Croghan. “I think they looked it up and it was 2017 since we’ve won a first round regional game, so it’s a good start for our program.”

The Wildcats took a 2-0 lead to open set one, but the Wolves offense fought back and tied the game at seven when Junior Grace Carroll came up with a kill. The Wolves hung in the set with the Wildcats, and managed to tie the set at 18. A few plays later, Sophomore Addisyn Bandow came up with a kill, putting the Wolves up 21-18. The set ended courtesy of another Bandow kill.

In set two, it was a back-and-forth battle with a big kill by Wolves Junior Anna Stangl putting her team up 8-5. The Wildcats rallied to tie the game at 12, but the Wolves got the lead right back when Bandow came up with a kill retaking the lead. The set ended when Freshman Keagan Eischeid had a kill, followed by an ace putting the Wolves in the driver’s seat heading into set three.

“I thought they all came in ready to go, ready to play,” Croghan said. “We had some net violations, which are hitting net violations, but they adjusted to that well, and they came in really focused and ready to play.”

Set three opened with the Wildcats taking a 7-3 lead, but the Wolves offense found a groove tying the set at nine points when Bandow had a kill and Carroll had an ace, giving them a 10-9 lead. Later in the set, Carroll had three consecutive kills, which expanded the Wolves lead to 21-15. The Wolves won the set 25-18 sweeping the Wildcats.

“I was really impressed with that,” Croghan said of the sweep. “We haven’t done that very much in the season. It was definitely a really good one.”

The Wolves played the next round of Regionals Wednesday night, where they took on the 28-2 River Valley Wolverines. The Wolverines are led by Senior Myah Dausel with 698 assists and 56 serve aces, Senior Addie Law with 347 kills, Senior Sunny Todd with 39 blocks, and Senior Jacy Jacobson with 349 digs.

“We’ve got to be ready to go, play hard, and find open spots when we can,” Croghan said. “Offensively, if we play our game we should be fine.”