Garfield G-Men junior Tenley Korosec (pictured center) registered her 1,000th career assist this week in a team win.

By Roger Gordon

Correspondent

Tenley Korosec has reached and surpassed 1,000 career assists.

And the Garfield setter is only a junior!

Korosec achieved the feat in a Sept. 29 home win over Mahoning Valley Athletic Conference Grey Division rival Warren Champion on Youth Night.

“Tenley has played with amazing hitters and passers to give her those opportunities,” head coach Ali Roach said. “She’s a leader on the court and likes to celebrate her teammates the majority of the time, so it’s nice that she’s able to be recognized for this big honor that she reached.”

Five nights earlier, on Sept. 24, Korosec’s 43 assists, 15 digs and four aces helped the G-Men to a 25-23, 23-25, 25-22, 25-23 victory at division rival Leavittsburg LaBrae. They are now 8-6 overall and 7-2 in the division.

“Tenley had a really well-rounded match,” said Roach. “She has such a strong game.”

As for the match itself, it was extremely competitive, just like always.

“It’s a battle every year when we play them,” the coach said. “I think (LaBrae head coach) Courtney (Kish) and I have similar coaching styles. We had won in three sets earlier in the season, but it was not an easy win. So we kind of prepped the day before to lead us into what we needed to work on for that day and the match. We’d tie it up, then they’d take the lead. They’d tie it up, then we’d take the lead. It was so back and forth, very evenly matched, and both teams fought super hard, and the score definitely reflects that. It just came down to the very end every single set. I still think we played super strong. I think LaBrae has improved from the beginning of the year.”

Junior middle hitters Lola Lake and Leah Hill paced the front line, the former with 16 kills and the latter with 14 kills and two blocks.

“Both Lola and Leah dominated in the middle,” Roach said. “They also turned on their blocking game and made some really crucial blocks toward the end of the match, especially Leah and her sister Jordyn up at the net. Those were game-changing plays for us.”

ROOTSTOWN

Rootstown came out of the gate on fire in its match on Sept. 29 at Chagrin Valley Conference Valley Division foe Kirtland.

“We had a ton of energy,” head coach Dana Kern said of her team that won the opening set 25-18. “I was surprised getting off the bus after an hour with the amount of energy my players had coming into the first set because we typically struggle with that a little bit. But they came out and were playing really hard. Everything was just working out really well. The kids were hitting shots, they were putting the ball were the opposing players weren’t, they were really moving the ball well.”

Then came sets two and three that the Rovers lost 25-9 and 25-13.

“All of a sudden, the energy just stopped. It died,” said Kern, who then had to deal with losing sophomore libero Ella Hayn to illness midway through the second set. “That kind of messed up the girls a little bit because we were out of rotation. Ella came back in the third set and tried to play through it the rest of the way, but she still wasn’t feeling the best. We just couldn’t get our energy to come back and stay up where we needed it.”

The visitors managed to win the fourth set 25-18 but were beaten 15-7 in the fifth set, slipping to 9-6 overall and 3-5 in the division.

Pacing Rootstown were junior outside hitter Sophia Byers, who had 10 kills, and senior middle hitter Sophi Smith, who totaled nine kills and five blocks.

“Sophia played great,” said the coach. “She has a very high volleyball IQ. She sees a lot of the floor. She doesn’t always have to hit the ball the hardest. She will look and see if she can push it down the line, if she can just tip over your block, if she can swipe it off your hand. She’s the one who we kind of look to when we start to get in that funk a little bit, when we need something to get us rolling.

“Sophi is the one who will put the ball away hard when we need it. If there’s an overpass, she’s going to hit it as hard as she can to put it down to make a statement, and that kind of gets the girls super excited. So we look for moments like that from her to be able to help get the team going. Blocking-wise, she’s always looking to at least get a hand on the ball. She moves well,

she reads the setter well so she can get to the block.”

WINDHAM

What a way to halt an 11-match losing streak.

Windham defeated Northeastern Conference foe North Bloomfield Bloomfield 26-24, 25-22, 26-24 on Sept. 24 at home.

“This was a great match and it was so nice to put an end to our losing streak,” head coach Lauryn Gintert said. “The last time we played Bloomfield we lost in five sets, so to see us win in three this time around shows the hard work and improvement the girls have been working towards pay off.”

Junior middle blocker Makenna Jones paced the Bombers with seven kills and two blocks.

“Makenna has been a solid player all year,” said Gintert. “She leads in blocks and kills as usual, and I am really enjoying watching her settle into this spot as she has been working so hard to improve on her issues with hitting and blocking. Now she’s just a natural when you watch her.”

Four nights later, on Sept. 28, Windham fell 25-12, 25-19, 19-25, 25-17 at home to conference rival Kinsman Badger.

“Going four sets with Badger was tough,” said the coach. “We had the pieces to win, we just could not put them together fast enough or keep them there.”

Middle blocker Makenzi Blockinger led the home team in service points and hits.

“Makenzi had a great match,” Gintert said. “She was on fire and is really trying to get the most out of her senior year.”

The coach is pleased with her players’ efforts during a topsy-turvy season, which now has the team at 5-13 overall and 4-11 in the conference.

“The girls have been working hard and doing the best with what we have,” she said. “I am proud of them for the adjustments and always trying to do the best they can.”

SOUTHEAST

Injuries and other unfortunate circumstances have forced Southeast head coach Mary Tarka into playing a handful of sophomores who are not ready for prime time.

One of those times was Sept. 24 when the Pirates lost 25-23, 25-12, 17-25, 25-14 at home to Mahoning Valley Athletic Conference Grey Division rival Newton Falls.

Southeast is now 6-10 overall and 4-4 in the division.

Pacing the Pirates were senior libero Elise Kennedy, senior middle hitter Leila Evans and sophomore left-side hitter McKenna Bailey, who served six aces.

“Elise played all the way around on the left outside last year,” said Tarka, “but moved to Libero this year because she saw our team could use that. She sees the court well, she anticipates, she moves her feet and she tries to adjust if she realizes she’s not quite where she needs to be or made a mistake. She plays well.

“Leila is always competitive, has good serves, hits the ball hard and places it well.

“McKenna has played mainly junior varsity but stepped into spots where we have some people missing.”

CRESTWOOD

Crestwood came tantalizingly close to winning the first two sets of its Sept. 29 match at Chagrin Valley Conference Valley Division rival Rocky River Lutheran West.

The Red Devils, however, lost them and the match 26-24, 25-23, 16-25, 25-12. They fell to 5-10 overall and 2-6 in the division.

“There were definitely a couple things the girls did really well. They had some good swings, they stayed in system a lot,” assistant coach Oliver Wuensch said. “What was difficult with those first two sets is when you finish a set and it’s a two-point difference, you can point to pretty much any point in the match where a mistake or communication error was made. In the first set, we had an out-of-rotation call against us, so those things obviously have an out-

weighted impact when it’s that tight of a match. That was hard. There were mistakes on our end. It’s those little mistakes. If you make one, it compounds and becomes bigger and bigger.”

Rootstown came out like gangbusters again in the third set, but sophomore setter/middle hitter Reese Harper went down with an ankle injury. The visitors, though, weathered the storm due to junior setter Haley Podojil’s sensational performance that resulted in approximately 15 assists.

“Haley really stepped up,” said Wuensch. “We made very few mistakes in that third set, and. Lutheran West started making a lot. We took advantage of those and won the set and had all the momentum. When the fourth set came around, we shifted the lineup a little bit now that we knew for sure Reese wasn’t coming back. But it was just very clear that we were playing in a lineup and in a rotation we weren’t used to. We also didn’t have one of starting middles on the court, so that hurt, and we had Haley playing six rotations. We just started making errors and mistakes, and Lutheran West started taking advantage of the fact that we didn’t have Reese in the game – she has the most blocks on our team this season – by finding holes, finding spots.”

Senior outside hitter Abby Hayes was another bright spot.

“Abby played really good defense, got a lot of balls up, a lot of tough swings to a lot of hard swings,” the coach said. “She had, if not the most, the second most kills in the match. She’s another one of our top servers who was knocked out of her serve fairly early on when she was serving in the first two sets, but she didn’t let it affect her. She came back and still ended up with eight service points and got an ace. I thought she had a really good all-around match.”