Red Devils Battle Lions for Conference Crown

The competition was fierce, and the game was close, as the Red Devils and Lions faced each other for the West Suburban Conference Silver Division championship Tuesday night. Hinsdale Central gave it their all for Senior Night, but Lyons township mounted comebacks during both sets to win 25-21, 25-23.

Hinsdale Central, (20-9, 4-2,) which would have won a share of its first conference championship since 1976 with a win, went on a 9-0 run in the opener, with senior libero Jamie Netisingha serving eight straight points, including three aces, to give the hosts an 11-5 lead. The Cincinnati recruit flustered the LT defense by mixing a variety of floaters and deep serves.

"In my head I was thinking make them move, make their best hitters pass the ball," Netisingha said. "If they pass the ball they can't hit, so as long as they move, that was the game plan."

"They served tough at us and our serve-receive was a little weak, but that wasn't the only thing that was bad," LT setter Alexis Viliunas said. "Our all-around game wasn't as good as it usually is."

Even so, the Lions, (31-1, 6-0,) rallied behind the play of the Illinois-bound Viliunas, who spiked two kills and two blocks during an 8-3 run that ended Game 1. She finished with 11 assists, three blocks and three kills and is gradually rounding into form after breaking her wrist in July.

"I haven't really played with these middles before, so it's going to take me a little while to get connected, but I think right now we're getting better at it," said Viliunas, who played her 12^th match since returning. "We're working on it in practice, so I think by the end of the season when we need it to be good, it will be there."

 It was there when the Lions needed it in Game 2. LT grabbed a 12-7 lead but once again the Red Devils used good serving, this time five straight points from Katie Grabowski after an Ally Davis kill, to go ahead 13-12.

Central was still up, 22-20, when a block and a kill from Jocelynn Birks pulled the Lions even. After a serving error put the hosts back in front, Viliunas set Birks for a kill and back-to-back blocks from middle hitter Julia Watkins and outside hitter Laura Williams ended it.

"We're happy we did it in two, but the good thing is we can still play better," LT coach Joann Pyritz said. "Defensively we picked up some important balls, but we also let some important balls go and we have been picking those up."

Birks led the Lions with 12 kills, while Williams had six kills and setter Erin Juley added 11 assists and seven service points.

Davis paced the Red Devils with six kills, while Northwestern recruit Natalia Skiba and Katarina Milojevic both had four kills.

Netisingha said the Central's goal is to play Lyons again. The two would not meet until the state title game.

"We've seen spurts of our greatness and how good we really can be, but we only show it at certain times and I know we have it in us to do a lot better," Netisingha said. "The only thing that's keeping us [back] is just a little bit of our lack of experience. I know [the Lions] have got experience at every position on the court and they're a really strong team because of that. We're right there with them. We just have to pick it up a little bit more with our defense and our blocking. Our hitting is really good, we just got to be able to back it up with our defense and blocking."

Hinsdale Central Coach Sherraylyn Kellough believes the Red Devils are capable of such improvement.

"It really seemed like it took us the whole first game to really get composed and settled in," she said. "Part way through Game 2 is when we started to get into our rhythm. [The comeback] shows that they wanted it and they wanted to fight for it. If we could have made the middle of Game 2 the start of the match, things may have turned out a little different for us."

The Lions reached the Class 4A state championship game last year. Tuesday night's victory gave them their second consecutive West Suburban Conference Silver Division championship.