Ryan Murken

Your Prep Sports

IOWA CITY – The Iowa Girls High School Athletic Union unofficially announced West High as a state title contender when it ranked the Trojans second in its preseason Class 5A rankings last week.
West High certainly looked comfortable in that role in its season opener on Tuesday.

Sophomores Cyan Blommer and Josephine Austen each had 10 kills as West High swept sixth-ranked Cedar Rapids Kennedy 25-23, 25-19, 25-15 in the season opener for both teams at West High.

“We were really excited when the rankings came out but then also at the same time we use it as motivation to keep that ranking,” Austen said. “We know that other teams are going to look at that and want to beat us and that’s made us want to work even harder to keep that ranking up there.”

Coming off a 27-6 season that included its first state tournament trip since 2016 the expectations were sky high for West High entering this season.

The preseason ranking only elevated those expectations for the Trojans.

“Even though we are ranked really high now we still have to live up to that and prove it,” Blommer said. “We need to make sure we are still doing the little things.”

At least on Tuesday the Trojans looked like a team poised to back up it’s preseason billing.

West High overcame a slow start in the opening set, rallying from an early 15-13 deficit to take an early lead.

The Trojans snapped a 23-all tie on a Blommer kill and won the opener on a Cougar hitting error.

“In the beginning we were a little frazzled,” Austen said. “We kept our heads high, we realized that it just a game, we kept our energy high which I think that’s what led to everything that happened in the game.”

It was all West High over the final two sets.

The Trojans used a quick five-point burst that featured a pair of kills by senior Sophia Austen to take an early 5-1 lead in the second set and never trailed again.

After failing to record a kill in the opening set Sophia Austen had seven of her eight kills in a 25-19 win in the second set.

The senior started a 3-0 West High run that closed out the second set with a kill.

“After the first set we really settled in and we were on it, we were dotting our I’s and crossing our T’s,” West High coach Jaedynn Evans said. “That first game you could tell we were pretty nervous and after that set we started getting Lila (Eastvold) a good pass and we could run our offense and move the ball.”

West High trailed 11-10 in the third set but rattled off seven consecutive points to take a lead it would never give up.

The 7-0 run started with a Lila Eastvold block and Eastvold added an ace serve during the seven-point run that also featured a block by Blommer and an Olivia Headings kill.

“I think we just communicated a lot better,” Blommer said. “We missed a lot of serves early but we were being aggressive so we wanted to keep being aggressive at the service line and we just tried to limit our mistakes and force them into mistakes.”

Junior Taylor Otte added eight kills for West High which finished with a 40-20 edge in kills and had nine blocks to four for Cedar Rapids Kennedy.

“Tonight looked a lot better than what I’ve seen and the thing that I keep reminding them is it’s hard to get there but it’s even harder to stay there,” Evan said. “We do have a big target on our back now so what we do in practice matters every day.”

CR Kennedy              23  19  15

West High                  25  25  25

West High (kills-aces-blocks)

Cyan Blommer 10-0-2, Izzie McDonald 0-0-0, Lila Eastvold 2-1-2, Olivia Headings 2-0-0, Sophia Austen 8-1-3, Josephine Austen 10-0-2, Taylor Otte 8-0-0, Totals 40-4-9.

Assists – Lila Eastvold 30

Cedar Rapids Kennedy (kills-aces-blocks)

Keira Mueller 0-0-2, Addy Phillips 3-0-2, Hayden Scott 5-0-0, Kaycee Cory 6-0-0, Charley Lovell 0-2-0, Skyylan Ousley 5-2-0, Maddie Kray1-0-0, Totals 20-4-4.

Assists – Charley Lovell 10, Kayee Cory 9, Addison Stallman 1

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