This story is sponsored by: The Marshfield Tiger Booster Club
By Paul Lecker
MarshfieldAreaSports.com
WAUSAU – The Marshfield volleyball team ran into a buzzsaw and saw its season come to an end.
Hudson played nearly flawless, pounding Marshfield up front to win a WIAA Division 1 sectional semifinal 3-0 on Thursday night at Wausau East High School. The Raiders won 25-19, 25-9, 25-16.
Hudson (35-2), the No. 1 seed in the sectional, moves on to a sectional final against No. 2 seed River Falls (30-8), on Saturday at a site to be determined with a berth in next week’s state tournament on the line. Marshfield ends its season with a 37-5 record.
“They (Hudson) played at a really high level tonight and didn’t let a lot of balls drop,” first-year Marshfield head coach Josh Knecht said. “They didn’t give us a lot of easy, free points. Eventually it got to our girls that it was going to be such a battle.”
Hudson used a 7-0 run in the first set to pull ahead 12-5 as four different players had kills in the surge.
Marshfield started to get its offense moving late in the set as Alyssa Foemmel had a kill, Lauren Homolka had a block kill and Kailyn Kurth served an ace to close the deficit to 19-16.
A kill from Della Smith kept Marshfield in it at 21-19, before Hudson gained a sideout and ran out the final three points, the final one on an ace by Paige Prasnicki.
The second set was a rough one for the Tigers.
After a Foemmel kill gave Marshfield the first point, Hudson ripped off 12 of the next 14. Senior Ellie Burns had five kills and two assists in the burst that put the Raiders up 12-3.
Marshfield never recovered, scoring back-to-back points only twice in the set. Three Kills by Jana Jankowski and another ace from Prasnicki ended it with a 25-9 for the Raiders.
“That first game, I thought we had some momentum and energy, we got close, and then they ran out the last couple of points,” Knecht said. “If we could have won that game, maybe things would have changed a little bit. Once they won that one, they really took it to us in Game 2 and the girls couldn’t get it going. Credit that to Hudson, they are a really good team.”
The third set was similar to the first. After a kill from Smith tied the match at 4-4 for the Tigers, Hudson ran off seven points in a row.
The Tigers got as close as four at 14-10 after two Homolka kills, but Hudson was able to maintain a comfortable lead the rest of the way and finish off the victory 25-16.
“I’m really happy with how the girls left it all out there, we just lost to a better team,” Knecht said. “They were always willing to do whatever we asked them, working hard, trying new things maybe they haven’t tried before, but the biggest thing this year was our chemistry. We had a really strong group of girls that really liked playing with each other and fun doing it.”
Homolka finished with 10 kills and Smith had six for the Tigers.