Storms don’t deter Vikings volleyball from win in GC; Warriors’ Rosen helps seal Colfax loss

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It was a long week for Colfax’s volleyball team as it took on a much improved Glenwood City team in Dunn-St. Croix action and followed that up against a strong, non-conference challenger from Clear Lake. The Vikings earned a split beating the Toppers on the road before falling at home to the Warriors.

Colfax traveled to Glenwood City on Tuesday, September 24, and even with the bad weather took down the Hilltoppers in four sets.

Thursday, September 26, proved to be a different story for Colfax as the Clear Lake Warriors came ready to defeat the host Vikings, which they would in four sets. Julianna Rosen was a powerhouse for Clear Lake as she was versatile from all sides of the floor and was particularly tough when it came to kill shots.

Colfax, 2-0 in the Dunn-St. Croix and 15-7 overall, will host a pair of conference matches this week. Mondovi was in Colfax last night, to open October play, and the Lady Vikings will host Durand this Thursday, October 3. Colfax is slated to travel to Bloomer next Tuesday, October 8 for a non-conference tilt against the Blackhawks.

Glenwood City

Despite the bad weather that rolled into the region last Tuesday, September 24, Colfax’s D-SC match in Glenwood City was not halted due to the severe weather warnings as the Vikings took the Hilltoppers down in four sets with scores of 25-19, 25-13, 22-25, and 25-14.

“Losing the third set seems to be a consistent theme in conference so far,” said Vikings’ head coach Pam Meredith.

Despite playing well in sets two and four, Meredith was “unimpressed with our tenacity from start to finish.”

Colfax can play at a high level, but for whatever reason get in the way of themselves and allow the other teams to capitalize on the high amount of unforced errors.

The Vikings did have three hitters in double digits, which Meredith was pleased about, as Kameri Meredith, Samantha Pretasky and Rachel Scharlau each finished the evening with 12 kills followed by Jozie Buchanan with seven.

Libero Addy Olson played particularly well for Colfax serving up seven aces and leading the digs with 18.

“I was pretty worried during the match as my Apple watch was going off and I was receiving texts and finally my oldest daughter called and I thought man, something must have happened because Lakken knows we have a match tonight and I am coaching.”

Little did coach Meredith know that there was a tornado that had touched down close to Highway 29 near Wheaton and Elk Mound.

“I can’t even imagine what is going on in Elk Mound right now – thinking good thoughts for all the families who have been affected by this storm,” Meredith said.

Clear Lake

The Lakeland Conference’s Clear Lake Warriors traveled to Colfax on Thursday, September 26, and put up a tough offense that left the Lady Vikes struggling to get to the ball in the 3-1 loss. The Warriors won with scores of 25-22, 15-25, 25-23 and 25-19.

Colfax did however go on the offense early in each of the four sets as they struck first on an error in the first, a kill in the second, an ace by Taylor Irwin in the third and a kill in the fourth.

“I was pleased with the effort we put forth against a high-caliber team, Clear Lake is 19-0 and ranked as a state contender in Division 4,” said Coach Meredith. “Our serve receive struggled against their tough float serves in set one.”

But it wasn’t enough for the Vikings as Clear Lake’s offense was able to move the ball around just enough to knock Colfax off for the win.

The first set of the game Colfax found themselves leading, but Clear Lake would put up six unanswered points to tie the game which led the Vikings to call their first time out 12-12.

A bad serve and a kill by Kameri Meredith gave the lead back to Colfax, but once again Clear Lake, with the agility of Julianna Rosen, took the lead back and would force Colfax to call their second time out and down by four 20-16.

Colfax began to bounce back in the first set with three straight kills by Samantha Pretasky and Kameri Meredith, followed by a block by Morgan Jensen and a four-touch error by Clear Lake’s Madison Zimmer who attempted to argue that there had been only three before the ball was passed back to Colfax.

Set two was the best team effort and passing for the Vikings. Jozie Buchanan had five kills in the set around the defense of the Warriors.

Buchanan had a soft touch and well placed aim as she scored several points for the Vikings when she hit the ball lightly to land in the middle of four of Clear Lake’s players. Buchanan continued with that running theme through all four sets for Colfax in hopes to off-set the power of Julianna Rosen, whom was like kryptonite to Colfax’s defense.

Clear Lake’s Zimmer would once again argued with the referees in charge during the second set stating that the Vikings had tipped the ball before it went out, but was once again told they had not to give Colfax a 22-15 lead. The Vikings went on to win set two 25-15.

“I felt like we had to give them a lot of free balls and their strong outside senior hitter #13 Rosen had a field day on us in set three,” Meredith said. “Sam Pretasky did a nice job shutting her down at opportune times finishing with seven block kills for the match.”

In set four, the Vikings allowed Rosen to control the match as they were unable to get her out of the front row, but Meredith was extremely proud of how the ladies handled themselves on the floor throughout the match.

Jozie Buchanan finished the night with 12 kills as well as 16 assists followed closely by Sam Pretasky and Kameri Meredith with 11. The Vikings also had seven aces total, three by Taylor Irwin who also had 10 assists, and only missed four serves which is a good ratio.