Redmen swept but better late in match; wins hard to find in Dells

RIB LAKE VOLLEYBALL

After a rough first set Tuesday, the Rib Lake volleyball team was much more competitive in the next two but couldn’t get over the top in either one and was swept 3-0 by the host Phillips Loggers in Marawood North play.

Mataya Eckert got on a hitting roll for Phillips in game one, helping the Loggers roar out to an 18-3 lead in the opening game, which they won 25-7. Eckert was tough for Rib Lake to slow down all match long, seemingly putting down kills whenever the Loggers needed one to hold off any runs Rib Lake made.

“Because we are, on average, a very young team yet, we need to continue to have the mindset that we can play against anyone, and not use that as an excuse,” Rib Lake head coach Heather Weik said. “We have some great talent on this team, but we just need to put it all together.”

The Redmen, who fell to 0-2 in the North and 6-15 overall, shrugged off the Loggers’ opening punch and were in game two up until the end. Josie Scheithauer’s hard push and Tessa Weik’s ace sparked a 3-0 start and Jennie Pichea had a couple of early kills to keep Rib Lake within 8-6. Phillips pushed ahead 13-8 behind a couple winners from Brooke Eckert. Rib Lake countered with a run that included two kills apiece from Pichea and Scheithauer and one from Coralee Glenzer. A service ace from Isabella Fallos made it 18-16 but the Redmen just couldn’t get any closer, eventually falling 25-20.

Rib Lake started fast in game three again. Pichea blocked Mataya Eckert for a 4-1 lead. Weik dug the ball out of the net, leading to a Pichea kill that made it 5-2. Weik fed Pichea for a kill that made it 7-3 but Phillips answered with a 5-1 run to tie it at 8-8. A Fallos ace and a Weik kill helped Rib Lake take its last lead at 11-9. Then Brooke Eckert became the hot hitter for the Loggers (2-0, 14-3) with three kills as the game turned in Phillips’ favor. The Loggers turned a 13-13 tie into a 23-14 lead and finished off the sweep at 25-16.

Pichea was the kill leader with seven for the Redmen, while Camryn Glenzer and Weik had four apiece. Fallos and Weik had two aces apiece while Camryn Glenzer had one. Weik had 12 assists and Addison Gumz had six.

Thalia Scheithauer received 35 serves from her libero position with just two errors and had nine digs. Weik had seven digs, Camryn Glenzer had six, Coralee Glenzer had five and Avery Niemi added four.

Rib Lake looks to get back on track Saturday at the Spencer Invitational, which gets underway at 9 a.m. and is scheduled to include conference foes Athens and Prentice as well as Manawa and Weyauwega-Fremont.

Rib Lake faces another tough conference foe, Abbotsford, Tuesday at 7 p.m. on the Falcons’ home court.

“I continue to see improvement in day to day practice and weekly games,” coach Weik said. “They are a great group of girls to work with.”

JustAGame

Rib Lake got plenty of court time and team bonding time over the weekend with the two-day JustAGame Fieldhouse Invitational in Wisconsin Dells. The Redmen played seven matches but, unfortunately, came away with just one win, a 2-0 sweep of Adams-Friendship on Satur-day.

The Redmen were defeated by Tri-County, Waterford and Rio on Friday and Laona-Wabeno, Bangor and Hillsboro on Saturday.

“We had a lot of volleyball this weekend,” head coach Heather Weik said. “The games didn’t fall like we wanted to, but we talked about what a great opportunity it was to grow as a team. We feel better prepared as we approach the second half of our season. We just need to learn how to win.”

The Adams-Friendship victory was a 25-18, 25-19 sweep. The offensive numbers were solid. Pichea and Weik led Rib Lake with five kills each, but Josie Scheithauer, Camryn Glenzer and Madilyn Blomberg added three apiece. Five players served an ace apiece. Weik had eight set assists and Gumz had five.

Defensively, Camryn Glenzer had 10 digs, Coralee Glenzer had nine, Tahlia Scheithauer had seven as did Weik.

Rib Lake pushed Rio to three sets in a 2-1 loss Friday. The Redmen took game one 25-17 and had the Vikings on the ropes in game two, but Rio escaped 26-24. Rio won game three 15-12.

Camryn Glenzer had six kills on 10 attacks with no errors, while Coralee Glenzer had six kills and just two errors in 11 attacks. Weik and Josie Scheithauer had four kills each. Weik had 10 assists and Fallos had four. Weik was 16 for 16 in serving with three aces and Coralee Glenzer was seven for seven. The team was 56 of 61 for a 91.8% success rate. Pichea had a solo block and an assist. Tahlia Scheithauer had 12 digs.

Pichea had six kills and Josie Scheithauer had three in the 25-19, 2517 loss to Tri-County. Weik had 10 assists, three digs and a solo block. Josie Scheithauer and Camryn Glenzer each had an ace as Rib Lake had a 94.6% serve percent success rate (37 of 39). Tahlia Scheithauer had 14 digs, Coralee Glenzer had eight and Gumz and Camryn Glenzer added five apiece.

Division 1 school Waterford took down the Redmen 25-19, 25-17. Blomberg was Rib Lake’s kill leader in that match with five, plus she had an ace. Camryn Glenzer had two aces and Coralee Glenzer had a solo block. Coralee Glenzer and Tahlia Scheithauer had six digs each, while Josie Scheithauer had four. Weik and Josie Scheithauer both had four assists.

Rib Lake nearly pushed Laona-Wabeno to three sets, falling 25-19, 25-23. The Redmen served well at 93% (40 of 43) with two aces apiece from Coralee Glenzer and Blomberg. Tahlia Scheithauer received 20 serves from the Rebels with zero errors and had seven digs. Josie Scheithauer had six digs and Weik had five. Pichea, Josie Scheithauer and Weik were the kill leaders with five apiece. Blomberg added three.

Rib Lake had another close second set in the 25-14, 26-24 loss to Bangor. Tahlia Scheithauer had 20 digs in the loss, Coralee Glenzer had 11 and Gumz had six. Josie Scheithauer had two block assists and Pichea had a solo block and a block assist. Pichea and Josie Scheithauer had five attack kills each, while Coralee Glenzer had four and Blomberg and Weik had three each. Weik had 13 assists and Gumz had four.

Hillsboro, a strong Division 4 program in recent years, beat Rib Lake 25-20, 2516. The Tigers didn’t give up much easy, but Rib Lake did get five kills apiece from Weik and Camryn Glenzer and three from Blomberg. Pichea had two solo blocks and two block assists. Weik and Gumz had four assists each and Josie Scheithauer had three. Tahlia Scheithauer and Weik had nine digs each, Gumz had eight, Josie Scheithauer had four and Isabella Gumz, Coralee Glenzer and Blomberg had three each.

Edgar 3, Rib Lake 0

The end result wasn’t what Rib Lake wanted but the performance was muchimproved in a 3-0 loss to visiting Edgar on Thursday night.

Two days after the Redmen played tentative against rival Athens in a 3-0 loss, head coach Heather Weik was much happier about the team’s response against the defending Marawood South champions.

Weik said it started with better communication on the court, then the energy picked up as Rib Lake got some saves, won some long rallies and made a late comeback to make the end of the first set interesting.

Edgar pulled ahead by five and six points at times in the set and led 22-16 when the Redmen made its run after a timeout. Camryn Glenzer got a kill then, after Edgar hit set point at 24-18, Glenzer smacked another winner and Coralee Glenzer found a hole in Edgar’s defense with a roll. A Wildcat error and a block on Edgar’s right-side hitter Makayla Wirkus make it 24-22 before Josie Scheithauer’s spike toward the baseline was about an inch too long, giving Edgar the 25-22 win.

Rib Lake dug out of an early threepoint deficit to tie game two at 10-10 on Weik’s well-placed roll, but Edgar went on a 5-0 spurt. Rib Lake came right back with a 6-1 run to tie it at 16-16, then Edgar scored four straight to force a Rib Lake timeout.

Out of the timeout, Rib Lake again kept long points alive and Edgar made some mistakes, allowing the Redmen to go up 21-20. Pichea’s kill tied it at 22-22, Weik found the back corner on a push to make it 23-23 and Madilyn Blomberg’s kill gave Rib Lake set point at 24-23. The Redmen, however, couldn’t close it out as Edgar got a sideout to tie it, Rib Lake couldn’t handle a tough serve from Kaitlynn Hartnady and Wirkus powered a shot through Rib Lake’s block to win it for the Wildcats 26-24.

Coach Weik said one of the key improvements in Thursday’s match was Rib Lake’s ability to not only dig up blocks by Edgar, but get them up to where the Redmen could transition from defense to offense and attack.

Rib Lake got out to an 8-4 lead in game three, highlighted by a kill and a hard tip from Pichea. But Edgar scored the next five before Weik’s push to an open spot tied it at 9-9. From there Edgar, slowly but surely opened up a lead. Pichea got a kill off a quick set from Weik to make it 18-14 and she tooled a shot off a block to make it 19-15, but Edgar ended it at 25-15 with six straight points.

Pichea registered eight kills in 25 attacks while Coralee Glenzer added six, Tessa Weik had five and Josie Scheithauer added four. Weik had 15 assists, while Addison Gumz added five. Tahlia Scheithauer had 19 digs in the three-set match, while Weik had 14, Camryn Glenzer had 12 and Coralee Glenzer had nine. Big long runs by Rothmeier sealed the deal. The Raiders went three and out on their first possession of the second half, but needed just one play on their second one. Rothmeier again took a direct snap, went right and got around some penetration by the Lakeland defense, accelerating through a big hole and sprinting untouched down the right sideline for a 60-yard score that made it 43-7. On Medford’s second snap of the fourth quarter, he took a handoff from Lissner and was able to bounce out to the left side for a 55-yard score that made it 50-6 with 11:07 left.

“He’s done very well,” Wilson said. “He’s almost a complete back with his vision and making guys miss. He just needs to learn to finish a little bit better in traffic. That’s where his upright running style can be a little bit of a hindrance on finishing at the very end of his runs.”

“Beginning of the year I was always so nervous getting into the game and didn’t really feel too comfortable,” Rothmeier said. “But now, getting into the full swing of things, you can give me the ball every time. That’s how I’m thinking.”

The ability to make people miss has really stood out in Medford’s back-toback wins to start Great Northern Conference play.

“A lot of work in the off-season just trying to work on my shiftiness and my quickness,” Rothmeier said. “I always watch highlights of really shifty players like Barry Sanders and I’ve seen my dad’s games (1998 Medford graduate Paul Rothmeier) when he would record them. He’s been a big inspiration for me.”

Heading north

Now 3-1 overall and one of three teams sitting at 2-0 in the GNC, Medford heads north Friday to Ashland (0-2, 0-4) at 7 p.m. For the fourth straight week, Medford will face a team seeking its first win. The Oredockers gave up all the points in the first half in last week’s 42-0 loss at Mosinee and fell 32-7 in week three to the other GNC first-place team, Rhinelander.

“They’re pretty young,” Wilson said. “They seem similar to Lakeland in the fact that they’re young and they play hard. They’re back to the triple option, they’re going to come straight at us with that. They’re truly reading it, so we’re going to have to be very assignment sound. That’s always something that’s a little scary because, the way we play against it, if our D-end tackles one guy, then you have to flow and scrape to the next guy that could have the ball. We just have to run a lot of reps at our kids to make sure we’re ready for that option game because we haven’t seen it yet this year. It’s the first year in a long time that we didn’t see it in the first couple weeks.”

Edgar’s Brooke Imhoff tips the volleyball over the attempted block from Rib Lake’s Josie Scheithauer (l.) and Jennie Pichea early in the second game of Thursday’s 3-0 sweep by the visiting Wildcats.MATT FREY/THE STAR NEWS