Second Half Starts

Katelyn Hegewald, the student-manager of the team, takes over the Milwaukee Volleyblog on a full-time basis in 2014.

Self-described as "that girl who sits on the bench and catches scarves, books, pens and sometimes even heavy necklaces that Susie throws when she gets frustrated," she will be writing the blog every week for the team and the many endeavors they encounter.

Today is her eighth installment for 2014.

We went into the weekend tied for first with Oakland and Youngstown, with Valpo and UIC tied for second. We traveled to Valpo and Chicago for a weekend of wins.

We headed down to Valpo on Friday and, as usual, stopped at the always-amazing Portillos. I am thankful for about a million things since I started doing this four years ago, but getting introduced to Portillos might be be in the top ten. So after the quick drive and pit stop for food, we ended up getting to the gym a little bit early, maybe not a little bit, more like almost two hours. The weather was gorgeous so the team got off the bus and started playing some old schoolyard games, which was a sight to see.

We got into the gym and Susie had everyone line up on the end line, a relay race was coming. After a very entertaining relay race, we played against the Crusaders and won in four. We got out of dodge and then got to our super-awesome hotel that had a pool with a waterfall right when you walked in the door (sorry, I am still secretly a 7-year-old at heart). The hotel also had a Starbucks inside of it which is pretty dangerous for me, I promised myself I wouldn’t get any, so naturally you could find me in line Saturday morning before we left.

Saturday we drove from Valpo to UIC and again, was a little early, so we took advantage of the unbelievable nice weather and spent a little bit more time outside in the Windy City. Another relay race, and a three-set match later we were on our way home with another victory. This makes us now tied for first with Oakland going into a one-match weekend against Green Bay on Friday.

As Maisey and I were sitting on the UIC bench, I remember turning to her and saying “God, I love this program.” I am not entirely sure of the play, but I am pretty sure it was a hard serve that Taylor passed beautifully out of her body line, Kayla did that really cool thing where she slides on her knees while setting a perfect set and Julie was there to slam it home. I turned to Maisey with the biggest smile on my face and again told her how much I love Milwaukee Volleyball. It was an outstanding weekend and I loved being apart of every single second of it.

Down in the Books

Katelyn Hegewald, the student-manager of the team, takes over the Milwaukee Volleyblog on a full-time basis in 2014.

Self-described as "that girl who sits on the bench and catches scarves, books, pens and sometimes even heavy necklaces that Susie throws when she gets frustrated," she will be writing the blog every week for the team and the many endeavors they encounter.

Today is her seventh installment for 2014.

This past week may have gone down in the books as one of my favorite weekends of these past four seasons.

I know I say that all the time, but seriously, so many shout outs this week! We started the week out with Western Michigan coming over and playing us Tuesday night, and what a game! If you missed the game just know that it was absolutely an outstanding game. A huge shout out goes to junior right-side Maggie Dunbar for getting her career high 20 kills against the Broncos. It was pretty awesome seeing basically every other ball Maggie touched be a kill. Way to go, Maggie. Another shout out from Tuesday nights game goes out to Hannah Blanchard who is currently tearing it up in the middle. We beat the Broncos and called it a night, and got back in the gym Wednesday for the weekend.

Friday we played our 'Go Pink' match against Wright State, who didn’t go down easy, but it was such a fun game to watch! We rallied against the Raiders and won in four. Senior outside Julie Kolinski lead the Panthers with 25 kills on the night. Susie agreed and commented at the end of the match that Wright State played well that we really had to earn that win.

Saturday night we wrapped up the three match week by playing Oakland, who is battling with us at the top for first place. We took the first set of the match, but Oakland would take the next three. Sophomore Myanna Ruiz and Kolinski both had 14 kills on the night, while junior Nicole Latzig made some noise with her 4 blocks and 11 kills, not to mention junior Kayla Prices seasons-best 55 assists.

In regards to the entire week, I believe that Susie said it best in her post match interview against Oakland: "They (Oakland) came to play, when you are the team to beat, it is very hard to win and play hard every single time. It's very hard and challenging, so we will be back to work on Monday."

So there you have it, the first half of conference play has come to an end. We will travel to Valparaiso on Friday and then head to UIC Saturday. I can not believe how fast this season is going! Only a couple weeks until the conference tournament, and as it stands now we are tied for first with Oakland and Youngstown. Hope to see you guys this weekend to kick off the second half of conference play!

Quiet Week

Katelyn Hegewald, the student-manager of the team, takes over the Milwaukee Volleyblog on a full-time basis in 2014.

Self-described as "that girl who sits on the bench and catches scarves, books, pens and sometimes even heavy necklaces that Susie throws when she gets frustrated," she will be writing the blog every week for the team and the many endeavors they encounter.

Today is her sixth installment for 2014.

We’ve got a short one this week folks. This weekend we only played one game and that was against in state-rivals and travel partner UW-Green Bay. But before we get into that, I’d like to just give a giant shout-out to the wonderful Green Bay Packers as they did work Thursday night and took care of the Vikings. Sorry to all you Minnesota people out there, gotta give credit where credit is due, you know?

Anywho, Friday night we took on the Phoenix of Green Bay. They were coming off of a tough first conference weekend as they lost to Valpo in three last Friday and lost to UIC in five Saturday night. It was bound to be a good match, and it sure was.

If you were at the game you probably noticed something about our bench. It’s packed. Like jam-packed. Three years ago when I started being the manager here, I had all the leg room you could imagine, really I could lay down across the chairs if I wanted to, I wouldn’t, but I could. This year, it’s a little bit of a tight squeeze and I am loving it! Our bench is full of some pretty great people and not only that but if anyone ever misses a play when taking stats they’ve got someone on each shoulder that they can ask for a replay of what just happened. It’s a full bench, but it sure is a fun bench, especially when Susie walks through and sings along to a song or cracks a joke.

We beat the Phoenix in four and are looking to move on to next weekends matches because it is our long conference haul. This coming weekend we are out in Ohio to take on Cleveland State and Youngstown State. Before I leave you there is one more order of business on the shout-out list that must be brought up. Over the last couple weeks a huge congrats goes out to senior libero Taylor Golabowski on reaching her 1,000th dig and senior outside Julie Kolinski on reaching her 1,000th kill! Great job ladies, and great job Milwaukee Volleyball!

Until next time...