By RICK PETERSON
TopSports.news
On Monday night Hayden's volleyball team, ranked No. 2 in Class 4A, felt like it let a win get away in a five-set home dual loss to Kansas City-St. Pius X, Mo.
Facing another tough test in the second set of Thursday's Senior Night match against 3A No. 2 Holton, the 16-6 Wildcats showed their grit in a 27-25 come-from-behind win before closing out the 3-0 sweep with their second 25-17 win of the night.
Mallory Tanking, Hayden's lone senior, receives Senior Night gifts from Wildcat teammates Hailey Schmidtlein (22), Sophia Wichman (3) and Clare Chisham (21) Thursday night in the Bueltel Activity Center. [Photo by Rick Peterson/TSN]
Mallory Tanking exchanges hugs with her Hayden teammates after being introduced on Senior Night Thursday. [Photo by Rick Peterson/TSN]
Hayden led St. Pius 2-1 in Monday's match but was unable to close out the win and coach Corrinne McGreevy said her Wildcats, the 2025 4A state runnerup, did a much better job of handling the pressure-packed situation against Holton, the 3A state runnerup a year ago.
"(St. Pius) was a great team, but we got complacent and we're too good of a team to not kick teams while they're down and not finish matches,'' McGreevy said. "We called a time out (tonight) and we said, 'Hey girls, this kind of feels like Monday night. We've got to flip the switch, but we're going to go up and not down.' ''
Holton (21-7) led 25-24 before Hayden ran off three straight points, ending the set on a kill from sophomore Clare Chisham.
"They flipped the switch up, they stuck together and they played as a team,'' McGreevy said. "They fought through it and we found a way to win in front of our crowd. It was really cool.''
Mallory Tanking, Hayden's lone senior, agreed with McGreevy that the Wildcats played much better against Holton.
"I feel like we realized that we didn't play to our full potential on Monday and we didn't play Hayden volleyball,'' Tanking said. "So I feel like we came in today wanting to show our full potential.
"We knew we had a lot of people coming to watch us today and it's our last regular-season home game, so we had to give it our all.''
After the Wildcats rallied for the second-set win, Hayden honored Tanking.
"I look to her all the time,'' McGreevy said. "She is not only an incredible volleyball player, she's an incredible person, and the thing I love about her is that she stuck with me from Day 1.
"We came in together and she trusted in the process, she trusted me as her coach and she's been thriving the last four year because of that. And she has my back and I have her back.''
Junior Blakely Walter sets the ball in Hayden's 3-0 Senior Night dual win over Holton. [Photo by Rick Peterson/TSN]
Junior Hailey Schmidtlein makes a return during Hayden's 3-0 dual win over Holton Thursday night. [Photo by Rick Peterson/TSN]
Hayden took a 7-1 first-set lead on a service ace from junior Blakely Walter and later used a run of kills from junior Hailey Schmidtlein to open up 17-9 and 18-11 leads and went up 21-13 on a Schmidtlein ace before closing out the win.
After the tight second set Hayden opened up a 20-8 lead in the third set and Holton got no closer than seven the rest of the way.
Match results
Hayden def. Holton, 25-17, 27-25, 25-17.
