With the task of facing No.1-seed Newton in the first round of Sub-State on Saturday, the Emporia High volleyball team, seeded eighth, would have needed to play almost flawlessly against the Railers if it hoped to pull of the upset.
Instead, all the Lady Spartans could muster was an admirable showing against Newton and its star, the 6-foot-2 Camri Zwiesler, as Newton downed Emporia High, 2-0 (25-10, 25-13).
“To win, we would’ve had to be special,” EHS coach Kendra Bloomquist said. “Newton, I honestly don’t know if they had a great team, but they had a great player — they have a tremendous player — and when you have someone like that on your team that does so many things so well, you should win.”
Zwiesler, a junior, considered to be the top player in the state and a future Division I signee, blistered Emporia High with nine kills and five service aces, displaying a power unlike any the Spartans had seen this year.
“She pretty much dominated the whole time,” junior Jessica Decker said. “If we could have stopped her, it would have been better; it would have been a more even game. She was just a good all-around player.”
Zwiesler asserted herself early in Game One, as she slammed home two kills to help the Railers jump out to a 6-3 lead. She then went to work with her lethal jump serve, recording all five of her aces in a 10-0 Newton run.
During the run, the Spartans had trouble receiving Zwiesler’s serve, which often screamed across the net and dived right in front of the EHS back row.
“The biggest problem was defending (Zwiesler) and her serve,” senior Summer Naab said. “Her serve had a lot of topspin on it, and once you can’t pass it, it’s really hard to attack.”
The Newton scoring flurry ended on an attack error by Newton’s Raeanne Yoder, but the damage had been done, as the Railers led 16-4 at that point and went on to win Game One, 25-10.
Bloomquist said she told her team to continue fighting after the first game, saying that there was still a chance to pull off an upset.
“That’s what I love about the game of volleyball — you never know,” Bloomquist said. “I’ve been a part of too many matches where in Game One, you get thumped and then you come back and win the whole match. That’s why they play best of three and that’s why they keep score and that’s why they play that second game.”
But it was not meant to be for the Spartans, as Zwiesler again took control early in Game Two, pounding out five kills to help give Newton another 6-3 lead and spark a 7-0 Railers run that all but knocked the Spartans out at 10-3. Emporia High fought but could never get any closer than seven points, and Newton went on to win Game Two, 25-13.
The loss ended Emporia High’s season, with the Spartans finishing with a 13-25 record.
Naab said the season was frustrating because of how close the Spartans were to winning more matches.
“The season had a lot of those games where they were moral victories,” Naab said, “but we just didn’t get the win.”
Bloomquist said the Spartans were so close to turning their fortunes around, but could never make that final leap into the win column.
“This is a great group of kids — hardworking group of kids,” she said. “At the beginning of the year, I would have thought we’d have had a better record than that. We played in too many matches where we finished up going, ‘We played pretty good, just not good enough to win.’ We’d get matches to three games or we’d lose some 25-19, 25-20 games, and this group could just never get over that hump.
“A couple wins here and there, and you never know what kind of momentum you can create.”