As the gymnasium lights dimmed, North Star’s student section pulled out their cell phone flashlights and SZA’s “All the Stars” blasted over the speakers, the North Star volleyball team took the court to a high-octane moment years in the making.
With the home fans roaring and energy surging inside North Star’s home gym, it was everything head coach Jeremiah Kroll had envisioned two years prior when he took over a struggling Navigator program.
“The first thing I said when I came and interviewed for this job was that I really wanted to make this an event. It was dead in here, there was no passion and there was no energy,” Smith said of North Star’s home volleyball matches.
“Tonight was a culmination of what that looked like with the pregame and our fan support; tonight was by far the highest-attended volleyball game in North Star history, and there’s a reason for that.”
Class A No. 2 Lincoln North Star rewarded its large home crowd with a 3-0 sweep (25-20, 30-28, 25-17) of No. 6 Lincoln Southwest on Tuesday, which confirmed the Navigators’ status as the city’s top-performing volleyball team this season.
“It really means a lot to us that the fans came out to support us,” junior Delainey Volkmer said. “We had to show out, and we did tonight.”
North Star (17-2) entered the match having suffered its only losses to perhaps the two best teams in the state — Class A No. 1 Papillion-La Vista South and Class B No. 1 Norris — and only having dropped four sets across their victories.
Southwest (13-5) came close to taking a set on multiple occasions, but North Star’s competitive fire prevailed in the key moments of the match.
After Southwest came roaring back from an early six-point deficit to tie the first set at 20-20, North Star responded by rattling off five consecutive points.
And when the two teams became embroiled in an epic second-set finale, which featured two Southwest set points and four North Star set points, the Navigators emerged stronger.
“We knew it was going to be a competitive match, and I told them in the huddle, ‘This is the type of game we’re going to have tonight; be comfortable in that setting,’” Kroll said.
The set-clinching point came from sophomore Marie Paneitz’s ace, one of 13 totaled by North Star overall.
The story of the evening for the Navigators was their success in dealing with a tall, athletic Southwest block that typically gives opponents trouble.
Setter Alex Kroll distributed assists to five different teammates as Volkmer notched a match-high 14 kills and Elsie Schmidt added 11 more.
“When Alex was running off the net having to set with just the one option against two blockers, they both terminated all night,” Jeremiah Kroll said of North Star’s outside hitters. “Both of them.”
The coach also said North Star’s hitters were “exceptionally good” in their out-of-system swings on Tuesday, with many of those potential free balls instead going down as Navigator kills.
“We have our defense behind us calling shots and we work on that every day in practice,” Volkmer said. “We trust each other to really see the court and find what’s open, and if we get stuffed, it’s onto the next ball and we swing harder.”
Southwest was led by senior Alivia Gustafson’s 12 kills and totaled nine aces of its own but ultimately lost its third straight match to follow a pair of defeats over the weekend.
North Star, meanwhile, is now on a three-match winning streak which brings it closer to its season-long goals.
According to Kroll, the mantra for this year’s North Star volleyball team is “eyeing history.”
With an 18-2 record that is among the state’s best, the Navigators are doing more than just dreaming it; they’re actively making history.
“The girls really want to do something North Star has never done; they’ve made it to state four times, including last year, but they’ve never won a game,” Kroll said. “We want to do more than just get to state this year.”
Love
0
Funny
0
Wow
0
Sad
0
Angry
0
Get in the game with our Prep Sports Newsletter
Sent weekly directly to your inbox!
* I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.
Luke Mullin
Husker football/baseball reporter
Get email notifications on {{subject}} daily!
Your notification has been saved.
There was a problem saving your notification.
{{description}}
Email notifications are only sent once a day, and only if there are new matching items.
Followed notifications
Please log in to use this feature
Log In
Don’t have an account? Sign Up Today