Millard North Holds Off Millard West in Five-Set Thriller
Millard North’s Paige Holdsworth, left, Eve Fountain (11) and Emma Grunkemeyer celebrate a point against Millard West during Tuesday night’s match. (Photo by Berk Brown) There were some anxious moments along the way, but Millard North captured a big victory…
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Continue ReadingMillard North’s Paige Holdsworth, left, Eve Fountain (11) and Emma Grunkemeyer celebrate a point against Millard West during Tuesday night’s match. (Photo by Berk Brown)
There were some anxious moments along the way, but Millard North captured a big victory on its home court during senior night against Millard West.
Millard North, 29-2 and ranked #2 in Class A, withstood a furious rally in the fifth set by third-ranked Millard West (19-8) and held on for a 25-21, 25-20, 23-25, 23-25, 15-12 victory.
After Millard West forced the fifth set, Millard North came out on fire in the final frame as the Mustangs jumped out to a 7-2 lead on an ace serve from Allie Kerns. Later, a service error by the Wildcats would make the Millard North lead 11-5. But, that’s when things started to get interesting.
Kills by Hailey Petersen and Bailey Wilson sandwiched between a pair of kills from Elise Gilroy make it 11-9 and forced a Mustangs timeout. Out of the timeout, however, Gilroy got another kill and Petersen did as well to even the score at 11 apiece. Millard North’s McKenna Ruch ended the 6-0 run by Millard West with a thunderous kills from the outside and senior Emmy Grant followed with a big block in the middle to make it 13-11 Millard North.
Grant then made it 14-11 with a kill in the middle. Millard West fought off one match point when a Petersen kill made it 14-12, but a service error on the Wildcats ended.
Both teams are now off until the start of the Metro Conference tournament next week.
Ruch led Millard North with 14 kills while Grant had 12 and Paige Holdsworth and Molly Plahn each had seven. Grant also led the Mustangs with eight blocks with Emma Grunkemeyer added four kills and three-and-half blocks in her first full match of the season.
Izzy Lukens had 40 assists and 19 digs while Emma Altman had 38 digs and Holdsworth added 28.
For Millard West, Gabi Nordaker had 20 kills while hitting .308. Bailey Wilson had 12 kills and Gilroy had 10. Nordaker and Wilson each added three blocks while Jaiden Centeno had 39 digs. Bree Green finished the night with 50 assists and 21 digs.