WIAA DIV. 5 SECTIONAL PREVIEW - Pirates get a shot at familiar nemesis in sectional semifinal

WIAA DIV. 5 SECTIONAL PREVIEW

If there was ever a time for the Gilman volleyball team to knock out the bully, now would be it.

The Pirates, owners of a WIAA Division 5 regional championship plaque after a 3-1 win over Owen-Withee in Saturday’s regional final, and two wins away from a spot in next weekend’s state tournament in Green Bay will face a much tougher Eastern Cloverbelt Conference rival, Columbus Catholic, in the sectional semifinal tonight, Thursday.

The Dons have been nearly impossible for, not just Gilman, but anyone in the Eastern Cloverbelt to beat since they started a run of eight straight conference titles in 2017. They haven’t lost a conference match since 2019, the year they shared the conference title with Gilman.

In fact, the Pirates haven’t beaten Columbus Catholic since a 3-1 win at the end of the 2014 season. Columbus Catholic teams have beaten Gilman 12 straight times, including twice this season, 2-0 in the season-opening Medford Invitational and 3-0 in league play at Gilman on Oct. 8.

The Oct. 8 loss was Gilman’s last. The Pirates have rattled off eight straight wins since then and carry an 18-10 record into tonight’s match in Marshfield against the 24-15 Dons.

The recent success has Gilman, owners of two straight regional championships, thinking their opportunity is now.

“This team knows they can beat Columbus. They know they can,” Gilman head coach Janice Komanec said. “They know if they can put it together, they can push through them.”

To do so, Gilman knows it will have to be at its best. That means attacking with consistency and continuing to limit hitting errors and continuing the outstanding defense and serving the Pirates have shown in recent weeks.

And the Pirates will have to play with confidence while fighting through the rough patches likely to happen in a bestof- five, do-or-die match. “I think if we come in and we play our game, there’s a chance,” senior libero Kayleigh James said after Gilman’s win Saturday. “We’ve played Columbus twice, so we’re pretty familiar with each other. Columbus has been the big dog for so long and they may have gotten conference champs, but I feel like we can win the final match. If we just play our game and play like us, we can take it.”

“We talk a lot about the next point,” Komanec said. “We can’t focus on how is this game going to end because then fear trickles in. We can’t focus on how is this set going to end because then fear trickles in. We have to focus on the next point.”

In the last meeting, Gilman had its opportunities in each set but could never hold the momentum long enough to take a set. Five Columbus Catholic players earned some kind of All-Eastern Cloverbelt honor this fall and all of them played key roles in that win.

Gracie Wilczek, who might be the Dons’ best overall player, had 11 kills and 15 digs in that match. First-team middle Aubrey Waldhauser got key points at key times and junior Shelby Spata had 10 kills and eight digs.

With Gracie and Shelby, their defense is phenomenal,” Komanec said. “We’ll have to get after the other players who are not as strong. Serve receive will be huge because they have strong servers. That will be big to keep us in system.”

Della Trader is a strong junior libero. She had 16 digs in the October win, while junior setter Alaina Egle had 24 assists. Sophomore Sophia Wilczek also gets time as a setter. She had 16 assists in the last win over Gilman.

The Dons, who were ranked second in Division 5 in the final Wisconsin Volleyball Coaches Association state poll last week, also come in on a bit of a hot streak. Since going 2-3 at the Sept. 21 McDonell Central Invite, Columbus Catholic is 12-2 with its only losses coming to Winona Cotter, Minn. at La Crosse Logan and a 3-1 defeat to Eau Claire Regis in the Cloverbelt championship match Oct. 17.

Gilman got honorable mention in that final state poll.

The other side

Thursday’s winner will face either fourth-seeded Royall or second-seeded Ithaca from the other side of the sectional bracket in Saturday’s sectional championship match at Almond-Bancroft. That match is set for 7 p.m.

The Ithaca Bulldogs are hot, having won 12 straight matches since mid-September. They are 19-7 overall, won the Ridge and Valley Conference with a 13-1 record and the regional title is the school’s first ever.

In regional semifinal play, they beat seventh-seeded North Crawford in four, including 28-26 in the fourth set. They were 2-1 against the Trojans during the year. They took Saturday’s regional final over third-seeded Seneca in five sets to go 4-0 over the Royals this fall.

The Royall Panthers have taken the underdog route to the sectional. They finished just 7-7 and in fifth place in the Scenic Bluffs Conference and are 16-16 overall, but they won two tight matches in the regional rounds to keep their season alive. They topped fifth-seeded De Soto 32 and upset the bracket’s top seed, fifthranked Highland, 25-22, 25-20, 22-25, 2725 on Saturday.

Junior Bria Gruen averages 4.3 kills per set and had 21 Saturday against Highland. She also has 55 aces and averages 4.1 digs per set. Junior Laya Wainwright averages 2.3 kills per set and had 23 in the regional final win. The offense runs through a solid sophomore setter, Elizabeth Klipstein, who averages 7.4 assists per set and has 780 on the season.

The teams played once during the regular season with Ithaca winning 2-1 at the Sept. 7 Richland Center Invitational.