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North Scott’s McKenzie Moeller Powers Lancers Past Dallas Center-Grimes in 4A State Volleyball Quarterfinal
With a dominant performance from senior leader McKenzie Moeller, the Lancers outlast Dallas Center-Grimes to secure a semifinal showdown against No. 1 Clear Creek-Amana.
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CORALVILLE — There was no secret who North Scott felt was its best weapon.
McKenzie Moeller's name was all over the pre-state information the Lancers had to provide prior to Monday night's Class 4A quarterfinal match with Dallas Center-Grimes
"When we filled out the questionnaire for the state tournament everybody on our team voted her as the serious one," said Lancer Coach Brian Schubert. "She is definitely our leader. She takes charge and demands for her teammates to do well."
Moeller demands even more from herself. The 5-foot-9 senior could not be stopped. She pounded home 27 kills, including the match-winner as the Lancers topped the Mustangs 27-25, 17-25, 25-16, 25-23 at Xtream Arena.
No. 5 North Scott (25-10) advances to meet No. 1 Clear Creek-Amana in a noon semifinal match on Wednesday. The Clippers moved on with a sweep of Sergeant Bluff-Luton. The Lancers handed the Clippers one of their three losses, winning a 2-1 decision in CCA's tournament.
Even though she was in the back row at the time, Moeller left little doubt she wanted the ball passed her way.
"Of course I did," she said with a big smile on her face. "All of us knew we had the momentum coming into the fourth set and we just had to keep our intensity up.
"Dallas Center-Grimes did a really good job on their side," continued Moeller. "They kept pushing us to the end. You don't see a lot of teams who do that. I'm just really proud of our team for how we stayed true to ourselves. When we do that, we are hard to beat.
North Scott had to fight off a pair of set points before finally prevailing in the opening set on a kill by, who else, Moeller. The second set was a different story as the Mustangs evened the match.
"We got away from our service pressure," Schubert said. "We weren't keeping (Dallas Center-Grimes) in a position where they couldn't run their middles as much. They get a lot out of their middles and we weren't stopping that."
In the third set, the Lancers jumped to a 21-7 lead and never looked back.
"Once we got into set three, we did a lot better job hitting some of the hot spots that we worked on," Schubert said. "We wanted to keep up the service pressure on them to try and keep them out of system and it worked."
The fourth set was similar to the first until. It was tied at 23-23 until a service error and the winning kill from Moeller ended the match.
Avery Edgington and Madison Messerly led the Mustangs, who finish at 26-12, with 13 kills apiece.
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