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Kirst’s key kills propel Jaguars over Pirates

BY MURRAY GLEFFE

CORRESPONDENT

ASHWAUBENON-Mabel Kirst played sparingly as a junior.

On this night, in her final season in a Jaguars uniform, she played a key role by ripping seven kills and blocking five shots in helping the Ashwaubenon Jaguars defeat the Bay Port Pirates 25-18, 22-25, 25-21, 25-22 in girls’ volleyball action. (Sept. 20)

“I’m so proud of Mabel tonight,” said Megan Wierschke, Jaguars volleyball coach. “I couldn’t hardly take her out of the game because she was on in every category.”

Maria Scherer led the Jaguars with 40 assists, Paige Barry had 14 digs, and Maddie Koch added 3 aces.

For the Pirates, Raegan McIntyre had 30 assists and 8 digs, and Shelby Stelzer 17 digs.

The Jaguars took an early 4-3 lead in the opener after Allison Nitti connected on an ace.

Ashwaubenon pushed the lead to 13-8 after Bay Port missed three serves on side outs.

“We didn’t take care of our business on the offensive side of things,” said Brendan Baier, Bay Port volleyball coach. “I think we missed six or seven in the opening set; that’s too many.”

The Jaguars took advantage and extended their lead to 19-11 after Crowley put away a kill and Kirst blocked an attempted kill by the Pirates OH Alyssa Koska.

The Pirates got no closer than four points the rest of the way and the Jaguars took the first set.

The second set saw a see-saw affair to start.

Midway through, the Pirates seized control after McIntyre started setting up her teammates beautifully at the net for put away kills.

Koch and Crowley tried to salvage the set by getting four kills late, but the Pirates were too much as they captured set number two by three points.

The pivotal third set saw the Pirates jump out of the gates and take leads of 5-3, 11-9, and 13-11.

Then the dreaded missed serves came back to haunt the Pirates when it mattered most.

The Jaguars took advantage with Scherer laying down dimes for Crowley and Koch to put them out in front 20-17.

A bit of controversy and confusion then reigned in on the main court in the Ashwaubenon High School Fieldhouse.

The Jaguars appeared to have a setting error on the ensuing point on a scrambling play.

Nothing was called and Ashwaubenon went onto win the point and take a four-point lead instead of being up only two.

Scherer and Nitti then went up high on the next point to connect on a perfect block.

It enabled the Jaguars to capture the third set by four points.

“I thought Maria really had things going all night, “ Wierschke said. “She especially put down some incredible assists in the key third set for both Maddie’s (Crowley and Koch) to do their thing.”

Could the Jaguars close the Pirates out in four sets, or would the match go the distance?

The Jaguars took an early 5-2 lead after an illegal Pirates formation was called.

However, the Pirates stormed back and took a 14-12 lead midway through the fourth set.

Both teams pushed through the draining heat and humidity and didn’t want to give in.

Down the stretch, Kirst connected on two short corner kills and added an important block alongside Anna Wendorf that enabled the Jaguars to go up 22-21.

“It’s the best game I’ve played for Ashwaubenon,” said Kirst. “I couldn’t stop smiling after the whole student section kept chanting my name when we were close to winning. It was really a neat feeling.”

After a Pirates missed serve, the Jaguars closed out the game with two patented kills.

“It’s a huge win for our program, “ said Wierschke. “We watched a lot of film ahead of time and knew what our sets and rotations were going to be going in. Proud of the girls for the performance tonight. We have to keep playing well now and concentrate on one game at a time. If we do that, our seed in Regionals will take care of itself.”

The Jaguars improve to 20-4 and the Pirates fall to 12-7.

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