Prelims aside, Western gets its shot

CEDAR RAPIDS -- It's on. Again.

Second-ranked Western Christian held up its end of the bargain for another climactic Class 2A finale, sidestepping No. 3 Sumner-Fredericksburg, 25-14, 25-20, 25-19, in the semifinal round Thursday afternoon at the U.S. Cellular Center.

So here we go again. The Wolfpack (45-2) meet No. 1 Dike-New Hartford (44-1) for the championship at 4 p.m. Friday.

And now, the Wolfpack can prepare for it. And talk about it.

"Whatever happens, nobody can take away what an awesome year we've had," said Western Coach Tammi Veerbeek. "Dike has a great team. But we feel we have the athletes to compete with them. We believe we can do it if we play well."

Friday final will be the third straight between these 2A titans. Dike-New Hartford won the last two.

"We're going to have to do everything well," said Western's Ema Altena. "We have to focus on our team. We can't control what they do. We have to control what we do."

Western earned another shot by controlling play each set. Sumner-Fredericksburg (38-4) had its moments, but Western had many more of them.

The Cougars fought to an 8-8 deadlock in the opening game before the Wolfpack began asserting themselves.

"We spread the ball around well," said Jade Schaap. "That got us ready for their blocks."

Schaap led the Wolfpack with 11 kills. Altena added nine, 6-foot-5 Haley Moss eight. Jamie Gesink contributed 31 assists.

Western enjoyed a 40-22 kill advantage, and Sumner-Fredericksburg injured itself with 25 attack errors.

Sumner-Fredericksburg battled back from big deficits in the second and third sets to make them both respectable at the end.

"I'm sad we lost, but I think we played well at times," said Cougars senior Jessica Eekhoff. "We played those girls a lot in AAU. I could look at a lot of their girls, I recognized each one of them."

Kally Frisch had nine kills for Sumner-Fredericksburg.