Erie-Prophetstown ‘exceeding all expectations’

MANLIUS – The Erie-Prophetstown Panthers had never reached the girls volleyball sectional finals before since the two schools co-oped in 2018, let alone win a regional championship.

When Ashlyn Johnson delivered match point for a 25-16, 25-22 winner over Seneca in Tuesday’s Class 2A Bureau Valley Sectional semifinals at the Storm Cellar, they got excited. Real excited.

“Honestly, me as a junior, I feel like it means a lot because this is my first year on varsity, and I’m really excited,” Johnson said. “I feel like we have a strong connection with the whole team, which makes it that much better and easier to play.”

“Our schools have never done this. It means a lot. We just keep growing and growing, which is amazing to watch,” junior libero Payton Umstead said.

Erie-Prophetstown (32-3-2) will meet El Paso-Gridley (29-6) in Thursday’s championship match at 6 p.m. El-Paso Gridley beat Orion in Tuesday’s first semifinal.

Junior middle hitter Lauren Abbott was especially active to start the match for E-P, hitting for four kills to help stake the Panthers to an 8-4 lead.

Audrey McNabb was equally effective at the net for the Irish, scoring an early block and adding two kills to help tie the set at 13.

Then the Panthers took off.

Jamie Neumiller hit for a 16-13 lead, Kallie Wisely followed an Irish net serve with a block and served an ace to put E-P up 20-15.

Junior Brynn Brown served an ace of her own to give the Panthers a 22-16 edge, and junior middle hitter Eden Johnson took a quick set by Kaylee Keegan to run it to 24-16 lead.

E-P took the first set 25-16 on an Irish error.

The Irish (32-6) scored the first five points of the second set, but the Lady Panthers rallied to tie the game at 7 on a block by Neumiller and took a 9-7 lead on an ace by Abbott.

Abbott brought the hammer for a big kill to put E-P up 16-12 and teamed with Kalie Wisely for a block as Seneca was ruled to be in the net to go up 19-16.

Seneca battled back to tie the score at 21. Johnson hit for a side-out, then tipped for another point to give the Panthers a 23-21 lead.

Johnson came back for the final point of the night with a crossing shot off Seneca defenders to send the Panthers to their first sectional finals berth.

“We go one week at a time, so we’re look forward to ‘What’s next? What’s next? What’s next?’ The girls have exceeded our expectations all year long,” Bruns said. “We graduated a lot of seniors. Jamie [Neumiller] and Lauren [Abbott] have played varsity three years. So I knew we had some experience. We lost our setter we had for four years, but Kaylee [Keegan] has stepped up tremendously.”

Seneca coach Noah Champene said it was case of pick your poison defending E-P’s hitters.

“They had multiple hitters. We very worried about [Abbott]. We very worried about [Johnson] and [Neumiller]. Seemed like whoever we focused on, they’d go to the other girl. It’s tough,” he said. “They’re a very good team. Not sure we played our absolute best game of the year, but when you play a good team, they force you to make some of those mistakes. I was proud of our girls effort though.

“I thought we were focused. I felt like we were prepared. We went on some runs there where we hung in for awhile and put us in spots where we could compete. Ultimately, they made a few more plays at the end of ther day.”

Johnson and Abbott each hit for nine kills while Neumiller added four.

That kind of balance is what makes the Panthers so strong Bruns said.

“That’s something we’ve had all year long. We’re not focused one hitter. We have multiple options. So when you can keep the other side guessing, [it helps]. They were very heavily focused on Lauren [Abbott] in the middle, so it was nice for my outsides to get the job done.”

“I feel they were really keying on our middles, and our outsides did a lot tonight,” Umstead said.

Also for E-P, Brown and Neumiller popped up seven digs apiece and Umstead had six while Keegan dished out 24 assists.

Lainie Olson had 14 assists for the Irish while McNabb delivered nine kills.

Both Bruns and Johnson pointed to winning Oregon tournament when the Panthers knew they had a good thing going.

“That was an eye opener for us, that ‘We can do some things this year,’” Bruns said.

“We just kind of went with the flow and when we won the Oregon Tournament we knew from there,” Johnson said.

it was a historic season for the Irish, who bow out with a school-record 32 wins.

“I was so proud of everything those guys accomplished,” Champene said. ”Those seniors, especially. Just an outstanding class and great leaders and great athletes. It’s a special group I’m going to remember for a long time. I think it’s something going forward we can build on with the younger girls.”