This story is sponsored by: The University of Wisconsin-Marshfield/Wood County
By Paul Lecker
MarshfieldAreaSports.com
MARSHFIELD – The Marshfield volleyball team has had its backs up against the wall the last two weeks, needing every victory it could muster to stay in contention in the tightly-packed Wisconsin Valley Conference.
The Tigers found themselves in a tough spot again on Thursday, but were able to pull out a 3-2 win over Merrill at the Marshfield High School Fieldhouse, to move into sole possession of second place in the WVC.
Marshfield won 25-22, 23-25, 25-18, 13-25, 15-13, to improve to 6-2 in the conference. The loss drops Merrill to 5-3. Conference-leading Wausau East (6-1) swept Stevens Point (5-3) 3-0 in another battle of top teams in the Valley.
Seniors Courtney Bauer and Miranda Forrest led the Tigers’ offense, with 16 and 12 kills, respectively. Bauer added six blocks, Sara Dasler had 19 assists and 13 digs, Darian Molter had a team-high 32 digs and Anna Ripp added 18 assists for Marshfield.
“I said in that last time out (in the fifth game) that they can not play to lose, they have to stay aggressive,” Marshfield coach Dawn Sadowska said. “When you get to that fifth game and something is on the line, teams start to tighten up. I could already see Merrill was doing that. If we could just play aggressively, we’d have to live with whatever happened and thankfully it ended the way it did.”
Marshfield led the entire first game after pulling ahead 9-4 on the serve of Dasler. An ace by Chelsea Akin finished off the game.
Merrill bounced back to control most of Game 2 until a 6-0 rally by the Tigers closed the Bluejays’ lead to 18-16.
Marshfield got as close as one but couldn’t take over the lead and Merrill evened the match on a kill by Rylee Folz.
Merrill took that momentum into the third game, leading 6-0 before Marshfield rallied again. Marshfield had four separate 4-0 runs and a late 5-0 run – with two kills each from Forrest and Bauer – helped the Tigers pull away.
Game 4 was completely dominated by Merrill. The Bluejays scored 18 of the final 23 points, three on kills by Aubrey Wardall, to force a fifth and deciding game.
“It’s kind of been what’s happened to us all season,” Sadowska said. “We’ve been able to come back from those type of games and act like that didn’t even happen, which is good. In the beginning of the season we were so worried about their mental toughness, but they’ve shown us in the last week and a half that they have come a long way.”
An ace by Molter put Marshfield up 10-8 late before Merrill stormed back to take a 13-12 lead.
After a sideout on a kill by Lauren Gilbertson tied the game, Bauer served out the final two points – a kill by Forrest and an ace by the senior.
“We’re working together as a team,” Bauer said. “In practice, we’re always cheering and keeping the energy up, which comes through when we play in games as well.
“We just keep reminding ourselves that we are the underdogs and we just need to come out with all of our energy and play as hard as we can, hit as hard as we can.”
Marshfield will play Wausau East and Wausau West at the second of the two Wisconsin Valley Conference Tournaments on Saturday at Wisconsin Rapids. The Tigers then close out the regular season with matches at home against Rapids on Tuesday and at D.C. Everest on Oct. 17.