By Bud Milroy and Mike Ramczyk
For a team that lost in the sectional finals in the previous season, it is hard to consider the new season a time to rebuild.
However, when you’ve been in the state title game six of the last seven seasons and have five state titles, anything short of a championship is a disappointment.
Last year, a young, inexperienced squad grew dramatically over the course of the season. A 15-23 overall record and fourth-place finish in the tough Metro Classic Conference doesn’t reflect the success the Toppers achieved as they fell just one win short of a trip to Green Bay.
The growth experienced in 2013 is expected to continue into 2014 as the Lady Toppers return the majority of last year’s squad.
“We have a solid core of returning letter-winners,” said Catholic Central head coach Mae-Mae Oberhofer.
Abby Tweet, Olivia Sobbe, Monica Litman and Tori Kempken accounted for 75 percent of the Catholic Central offense last year. Additionally, the Lady Toppers return their starting setter Sarah Gould, who recorded 441 assists last year, and their two top defenders in Lindsey Lehman and Sara Hackbarth.
Oberhofer also expects three newcomers to contribute significantly, juniors Kailey Kiekhafer, a right side hitter, Nicole Krause, a middle blocker and freshman defensive specialist Anna Hackbarth.
“I’m looking to take advantage of our strong serving (320 aces last year) and solid defense. If we can serve-receive consistently and side out efficiently, I think we can get into the top third of the conference,” Oberhofer said.
The Lady Toppers’ tough non-conference schedule will once again challenge the team with a trip to play perennial power Wausau Newman Catholic, the DC Everest Invite and the Westosha
Smash Invite.
Toppers step up competition
At last weekend’s Wausau Invite, Catholic Central showed it can hang with the big girls.
The Lady Toppers hung with Wausau Newman but fell, 20-25, 16-25, 10-25.
Central’s lone win came against Menomonie, 25-21, 25-7.
In other matches, the Toppers lost in straight sets to Tomahawk and Merrill.
Central split with two Division 1 schools, Kimberly (25-20, 20-25) and DC Everest (21-25, 27-25).
“When our serve-receive, defense and service games are strong, we can compete with these larger schools,” Oberhofer said. “At times we made too many mistakes and struggled capitalizing on the other team’s mistakes.”
Tweet led the team with 44 digs and added 14 kills.
“Abby had a great week for us both offensively and defensively and showed great leadership.”
Olivia Sobbe led the Toppers with 20 kills and added five blocks. Sarah Gould had 47 assists and 10 aces.
-
-
-
-
-