Cougars Volleyball advances to District Finals

Alex Staab – ICC Harbinger

East Peoria, IL – It was a crucial postseason match for the 9th-ranked ICC Cougars volleyball team (29-9), as they would host the Lewis & Clark Trailblazers (18-17) for a district semifinal, while also celebrating sophomore night.

The Cougars honored eight sophomores before the match, Maria Alferova (Morton), Brooke Gardner (Princeville), Lexi Mercer (Pekin), Claire Milnes (Prophetstown), Kenzie Rhodes (Dee-Mack), Selena Scudder (Limestone), Taylor Shaw (Annawan), and Leah TerBush (Metamora).

The visiting Trailblazers were only able to muster a couple runs and force a few Cougars timeouts, but ICC was in control, and would sweep this match, three sets to nothing. It was one of those performances in which you can’t name one player that performed better than the rest. The efforts of Mary O’Brien and Kenzie Rhodes are certainly worth mentioning. O’Brien led the Cougars with 14 kills, while Rhodes let the Cougars with 44 assists. There were also 10 or more digs from Maria Alferova (23), Taylor Shaw (11), and Jodi Daniel (10). Brooke Gardner and Leah TerBush followed O’Brien in the kills category, totaling 12 and 10 respectively.

ICC advances to the District Finals on Saturday, November 4th, at 4:00 pm. The match is at Lincoln College and ICC will play 5th-ranked Lincoln Land. The Cougars won the first meeting at the CougarPlex on September 16th, 3-0, but the Lincoln Land flipped the script on October 4th at ICC, beating the host Cougars, 3-0.

Team Twitter: @ICCVolleyball | Harbinger Sports Twitter: @ICCSportsLive | Alex Staab: @StaabAlex