Ryan Murken

Your Prep Sports

SOLON – Hitting a volleyball is all about timing.  

Timing is one thing Elli Becicka could never seem to get right.

Not the actually timing on a swing attempt, Becicka showed on Wednesday she has that aspect of the sport down pretty well.

It was more the right spot at the right time type of timing that seemed to keep Becicka from a career as a hitter.

“Last year I really tried to be an outside but with (graduated senior) Grace Keith in front of me I knew there was no way so I went to DS,” Becicka explained. “This year I was really trying to go for DS, I figured that was the only way for me to get on the court.”

When the timing finally lined up for Becicka on Wednesday night the Solon senior made it count.

Becicka started in place of injured sophomore Lauren Schrock and hammered a career high 10 kills to lift Solon to a 25-13, 26-24, 25-22 sweep of Vinton-Shellsburg in a Class 3A, Region 5 quarterfinal at Solon.

“I thought for sure the only way for me to get on the court was at DS but once Lauren got hurt I thought ‘you know what? Lets do it,’” Becicka said. “I saw it as my opportunity.”

The opportunity for Becicka came up when Schrock went down with an injury on the opening day for the WAMAC tournament last week.

Playing without its regular season kill leader Solon relied on a balanced attack led by Becicka to advance to the Region 5 semifinals.

Becicka led five players with at least three kills as Solon (22-17) set up a regional semifinal rematch with WAMAC rival Mount Vernon (25-15) on Tuesday at 7 p.m. in Solon.

“Our goal is to get to state, it’s been our goal since the beginning of the year,” Becicka said. “I know when Lauren is back she will be in front of me and that’s fine I just want to make sure we get as far as we can.”

Junior Katie Yi had eight kills and Solon rolled up 16 ace serves to earn its third win over the season over Vinton-Shellsburg (15-22).

Senior Kate Benzing had four kills and Abby Smith and Rachael Nelson each had three as Solon finished with a 31-22 edge in kills.

“We keep talking about how it’s not just one person it’s the whole team,” Solon coach Sarah Ferin said. “When we don’t have Lauren in there we tend to spread the ball out a lot more than normal.”

Solon opened the match with a 9-2 run and cruised to a 25-13 win in the opening set.

In her first extended postseason action at outside hitter Becicka sparked the Spartans early with three kills in the opening-set win.

“She has done really well on the outside,” Ferin said. “When Lauren got hurt we tried over there and liked it. She is a very smart player.”

The rest of the match was much tougher for Solon.

Vinton-Shellsburg used a 6-1 run to build an 11-6 lead in the opening set and led 14-10 before the Spartans mounted a comeback.

Becicka had back-to-back kills to pull Solon to within 14-13 and consecutive kills by Becicka and Taylor Noonan eventually tied the score at 23.

“I feel like Elli has done a really good job of stepping in and kind of filling that role,” Nelson said. “Not having Lauren it’s different on the court but we still have a really good player out there.”

A net violation gave Vinton-Shellsburg set point at 24-23 but Solon responded with three consecutive points the first two coming on ace blocks by Benzing.

“We had some errors but at one point or another we are going to pick it back up,” Yi said. “Once we started getting passes up everything started cleaning up and everyone had a chance to hit.”

Solon led 14-7 early in the third before Vinton-Shellsburg used a 6-0 run to get within 14-13.

The Vikettes pulled even at 21-all but the Spartans scored three of the next four points with Yi and Becicka contributing kills in the 3-1 spurt.

“We just kind of buckled down and we said we can’t let a set get by us,” Becicka said. “We were able to get a lot of balls up and that helped.”

Solon                           25  26  25

Vinton-Shellsburg     13  24  22

Vinton-Shellsburg

(Kills-aces-blocks)

Raelynn Murray 0-2-0, Madi Gray 4-0-0, Becca Steffen 6-0-0, Brynn Patterson 2-1-0, Taylor Spies 4-1-1, Josie Sagan 6-1-0, Chloe Tharp 0-1-0, Team 22-6-1

Assists – Josie Sagan 11, Becca Steffen 6, Taylor Spies 1

Solon

(Kills-aces-blocks)

Kennedy Bombei 2-2-0, Taylor Moore 0-2-0, Kate Benzing 4-1-0, Rachael Nelson 3-3-2, Abby Smith 3-6-0, Khaylor Fleck 0-1-0, Taylor Noonan 1-0-0, Elli Becicka 10-0-0, Katie Yi 8-0-2, Team 31-15-4

Assists – Rachael Nelson 13, Kennedy Bombei 7, Abby Smith 1