Lady Cards take first at home tournament

DEFEATING TWO ranked opponents in a row the Onaway Cardinals won their home tournament Saturday. Front from left are Daria Domke, Kaitlyn Boettger, Maddie McLean, Jaclyn Nash, Kayanna Dean and Michelle Anderson. Back from left are assistant coach Megan Estep, Calley Selke, Malaurie McLean, Sunny Flory, Jordan Larson, Kennedy Crawford and head coach Steve Watson. (Photo by Angie Asam)
DEFEATING TWO ranked opponents in a row the Onaway Cardinals won their home tournament Saturday. Front from left are Daria Domke, Kaitlyn Boettger, Maddie McLean, Jaclyn Nash, Kayanna Dean and Michelle Anderson. Back from left are assistant coach Megan Estep, Calley Selke, Malaurie McLean, Sunny Flory, Jordan Larson, Kennedy Crawford and head coach Steve Watson. (Photo by Angie Asam)

The Onaway Cardinal varsity volleyball team defeated two ranked opponents en route to win its home tournament over the weekend and defeated Johannesburg-Lewiston at home Tuesday to improve to 24-8-4 on the season and 5-1 in Ski Valley Conference play.
It took the Cards four sets to defeat Joburg on parents’ night where coach Steve Watson honored parents and seniors. Onaway jumped out to an early lead in the first set winning 8-1 but Joburg stormed back to tie the score at nine.
Onaway would again pull away some but Joburg wouldn’t back down as the game was back and forth. With Joburg leading 21-19 Watson called a timeout, a block by senior Kayanna Dean and kills by junior Calley Selke and Dean gave Onaway the 23-21 lead and they would hold on to win 25-22.
Set two was much more of the same back-and-forth battle and after Onaway fought back from behind to tie the score at 24 Joburg was able to get a kill and force an Onaway error to take the set 26-24.
“We often don’t play great on parents’ night. There is a little extra emotion in there and there is this feeling of finality for some of the kids I suppose. I give Joburg credit, they played really tough, especially in those first two sets. My greatest disappointment was that we jumped out to an early lead and then gave it away. I said to the girls that if the team is going to make a comeback we need to make it tougher on them than that. I was disappointed in how we let our foot off the gas pedal so early in the match,” said Watson.
Onaway’s fire was fueled as they won set three 25-13 and the fourth 25-11 to take the match.
Senior Maddie McLean led the attack with 10 kills, four aces and 11 digs. Senior Jaclyn Nash had four kills, 26 assists, two aces and eight digs. Selke had six kills, two aces and six digs. Dean had five kills, three assists and six digs.
Kennedy Crawford had five kills, two aces and nine digs. Malaurie McLean had three kills, five aces and eight digs while Jordan Larson added five digs.
ENTERING SATURDAY’S tournament at home Onaway was ranked eighth and they were hosting ninth ranked Rudyard and 10th ranked Rogers City. Rankings have since been updated with Onaway moving up to seventh, Rudyard at eighth and Rogers City in ninth.
Onaway started the day defeating Farwell 25-17 and 25-8 before splitting with Hillman 17-25 and 25-15. They then defeated Brimley 25-22 and 25-18 to finish first in their pool.
In bracket play Onaway defeated Mancelona 25-15 and 25-19 to set up a semifinals match against county rival Rogers City.
The Hurons took set one 25-19 but Onaway came together to take game two 25-20 and in the winner-take-all set won 15-10 to advance to the finals.
In a rematch of last year’s tournament finals Onaway defeated Rudyard 25-21 and 25-17 to take the title, their second in as many weeks.
Maddie McLean had 53 kills, 11 aces and 37 digs on the day. Nash added six kills, 99 assists, 19 aces, 43 digs and six blocks. Selke had 29 kills, 15 aces and 40 digs.
Crawford added 21 kills, 11 aces, 26 digs and six blocks. Malaurie McLean had five kills, five aces, 28 digs and seven blocks. Larson added 15 digs.
“It was a day littered with high-powered obstacles and the fact that we were able to overcome each one, I was very pleased with the way that we played pretty steadily. After you play a three-set match that is back and forth with Rogers City, you worry about a let off against Rudyard. There wasn’t any. We went out there and just pushed right through. You look at playing two other ranked teams and you are able to knock them off to win the tournament. I just hope we aren’t peaking too soon. We are playing a little better each week. I see some individuals doing some little things, positive things, that they weren’t doing before. We still have more to give, but we are progressing and hopefully we will continue to do so,” said Watson.
Onaway is home against Cheboygan and Cardinal Mooney today (Oct. 5) and are at their final tournament of the season Saturday at Morley Stanwood. Tuesday they are at Bellaire.