Girls Volleyball: Class is in session for Chicago Christian
By Tony Baranek tbaranek@southtownstar.com September 24, 2012 8:52PM
Updated: October 26, 2012 6:11AM
Monday’s 25-6, 25-6 Suburban Christian Conference crossover victory over visiting Walther Lutheran had its fun moments for Chicago Christian senior Sami Bruinius, especially at the start of Set 1 when she put down a kill and then served for 11 consecutive points.
“That was a first,” she said. “I’ve always wanted to do that. It was pretty cool.”
But not as cool, Bruinius offered, as being a battling underdog in a two-set loss to Class 4A powerhouse Marist on Friday at the Rich East Invitational.
“It’s kind of intimidating, but it’s really neat to be able to stand up with them and show them that we can play with them,” the 5-foot-9 outside hitter said. “Even though we’re a small school, we’ve got a really good group of girls who can compete with them and give them a run for their money.”
And learn lessons that often can’t be learned from most small-school opponents. Playing up in class as often as possible has been Knights coach James Garcia’s method of operating since taking over the program in 2008.
No. 10-ranked Chicago Christian (16-8), which is moving from Class 2A to Class 3A for this year’s state playoffs, was 2-3 against Class 4A competition at the Rich East Invite, beating Lyons and Queen of Peace and losing to Marist, Lincoln-Way Central and Marian Catholic.
“We struggled a little bit with our serve-receive,” Garcia said. “But when you’re playing the Marists, the Lincoln-Way Centrals, they have tough servers.
“That was our only weak point this weekend. And when we do serve-receive well we have the offensive tools to compete with anybody.”
In Monday’s quick dispatch of Walther Lutheran, Kim Hocker led the Knights with five kills, while Anna Persenaire added three. Megan Kamp (5 assists), Emily Workman (4 assists) and Maddie Wohl (5 digs) also were among the leaders for Chicago Christian.
