Photo by Jake McNeill/Marshall Independent New Ulm’s Isabelle Longtin (11) tips the ball during a Section 2AAA playoff volleyball match at Marshall High School on Wednesday night.

By Jake McNeill

jmcneill@marshallindependent.com

MARSHALL — A young Marshall volleyball team looked every bit of a veteran squad as it hosted New Ulm for the Section 2AAA tournament opener on Wednesday night. The top-seeded Tigers never let the No. 8 Eagles gain any momentum as they came away with a 25-11, 25-6, 25-9 win to advance to the section semifinals.

The Tigers made some early errors in Set 1 but cleaned them up quickly. By the end of the set, the score hardly reflected that any early struggles had occurred.

“You want to be crisp in these matches. We got off to a bit of a slow start, made a few errors early on, but to our kids’ credit, we kind of cleaned some things up in set two and had a little bit more of a dominant performance in that set,” Marshall head coach Dan Westby said.

While New Ulm was the underdog heading into the match, the challenge mounted during pregame warmups when Makena Meier turned her ankle, leaving her unable to play.

“She’s one of our best blockers, so I was going to use her in the middle against their two best hitters, so that was unfortunate that happened in warmups,” New Ulm head coach Christine Skoglund said. “That was a deficit to our game, especially in that second set. We could have really used her in the front row… but other people stepped up for us, so that was good. Morgan Hulke really stepped up and did that position justice tonight, so we did the best we could without her.”

Hulke was one of four Eagles with a solo block in the match, along with Brooklyn Lewis, Calli Koop and Kenzie Enter. Her three kills were also a team-high as she finished as the only Eagles with more than one, while Enter’s 11 set assists were a team-high as well.

Still, Marshall’s front-row attack was hard to stop. Brooke Gillingham and Avery Fahl were once again effective in their ability to spread the ball around, finishing with 21 and 20 set assists respectively. Fahl’s six kills were also third on the team, trailing Reese Drake’s 15 and Laurel Ryks’ 10.

Gillingham got Marshall off to a hot start in the second set, serving the Tigers up to a 4-0 lead before New Ulm got on the board. The Eagles stayed competitive until Marshall, leading 8-3, went on another 8-0 run with Fahl at the service line.

All match long, Marshall’s service was aggressive and accurate. Fahl went 18 for 18 from the service line with three aces while Gillingham went 19 of 20 with another pair of aces. Even when the ball didn’t fall for an ace, New Ulm struggled to return it in a manner that compromised the Marshall defense. Westby attributed the team’s success to its focus from the line, noting that the Tigers made some early mistakes but limited them as the match progressed.

New Ulm did not record a service ace in the match.

While Drake led the Tigers in kills, she also served as a focal point of the defense with 17 digs in the match. Also making major defensive contributions, Kezlyn Pinckney added another 11 digs.

New Ulm started the third set strong, jumping out to a 5-3 lead, but Marshall rallied right back ahead with seven unanswered points. After New Ulm ended its drought, Fahl led the Tigers to another 5-0 run from the service line and the team never looked back.

Koop finished the match with a team-leading three digs for the Eagles.

Marshall’s ability to control play throughout afforded it the luxury of giving its depth some postseason experience. The Tigers already have a young team, fielding just two seniors, so Wednesday marked many of the girls’ first taste of the varsity postseason.

New Ulm finishes its season with a 4-24 record, closing on a five-match skid.

“This season really went fast. These girls competed all the time,” Skoglund said. “Yes, we didn’t close out as many sets as we would’ve liked, but overall we competed hard from start to finish, so I’m very proud of them.”

New Ulm graduates six seniors with Meier, Hulke, Enter, Jocelyn Sellner, Mya Hornick and Natalie Sammons.

“Our seniors did an amazing job this season, on and off the court, trying to help the younger girls play to their potential,” Skoglund said. “That showed tonight. I played a lot of younger underclassmen along with the seniors tonight and I felt like it was a way better effort than we’ve had the past couple of weeks. Attitude was up, positivity was up, our seniors became better leaders tonight.”

Marshall improves to 25-6 after the win. The Tigers, ranked second in Class AAA, will now go on to host St. Peter (21-8) in the section semifinals on Friday at 7 p.m.