The girls varsity Volleyball team finally got a chance to show their home crowd what they were made of with the final score of 25-14 on Monday, Sep. 9. Wolves star and Division I volleyball recruit(to the University of Miami of Ohio), senior Olivia Rusek, put on a show for the well-attended Niles West crowd on the very first play of the game with a kill.
West sent a clear message right from the get go that they wouldn’t offer Lane Tech much breathing room as they took the first 4 points of the game. Later in the first set, senior Jessie Rosell and junior Keiann Williams would each add two timely kills of their own. Sophomore Dominique Krason came up huge as well, putting up three very impressive kills in the first set. West reached the 20 point mark first, on a vicious bounce by Rusek. Thanks to contributions from the entire team and unrattled composure– Lane Tech never served more than three times in a row the entire first set.
Krason and Rusek continued to work together in set two, adding 4 and 6 kills, respectively, to their nightly totals. West would go on their biggest scoring run of the evening at the when Rusek stepped up to the end line to serve. Thanks to two consecutive kills by junior Alexis Martinez and excellent hustle as a team while defending Lane Tech’s attacks, West was able to serve and score six consecutive times and blow ahead to take a convincing 15-6 lead. Lane Tech was never able to make a big scoring run– every time they scored a point and got to serve, West made it a priority to get possession of the ball back and stifled their hopes of gaining momentum by diving for free balls that seemed like they were sure to hit the floor, digging up oncoming down balls and setting up effective, dominant offense off of serve-receive.
Rusek dominated the game in many ways– terrorizing Lane Tech’s back row players with her high-velocity spikes, setting up her teammates for their own kills with on-the-money sets and making key digs off of Lane Tech down balls. She entered the game with a lot of personal and team goals in mind, saying she wanted to “Win, obviously, have at least 8 kills and get an ace”. It would be an understatement to say Rusek had a successful day and reached her goals; her team got an easy win in two quick sets, she racked up 13 kills and served the Wolves to their biggest scoring run of the night. While Rusek was the clear-cut star of the game, she admits none of her success would be possible without West’s other complementary role players. “I definitely think it was a true team effort because I couldn’t have scored any points without my teammates’ help. They all play a really huge impact as well. Whether it be a starter or a bench player,” she said, ” everyone is always involved and I thank them for that.”
West finished the Lane Tech Indians off in two very rapid matches. They took home the second set, fittingly, on a kill by Rusek to get a 25-17 .
Up next, it’s Skokie Skirmish: Volleyball style for the Wolves as they take on their rivals, Niles North, on Vikings territory at 6:00 on Wednesday, Sept. 11.
