Ryan Murken

Your Prep Sports

CORALVILLE – Clear Creek Amana didn’t get the result it wanted in its return to the state tournament on Monday.

The Clippers are hoping they gained the experience they needed to make another tournament run next season.

Fifth-ranked Pella rallied late for a 19-25, 25-22, 20-25, 25-18, 15-9 win over fourth-ranked Clear Creek Amana in a Class 4A quarterfinal at Xtream Arena in Coralville.

“It was wildly important for us to get here and experience this,” Clear Creek Amana junior Emily Henderson said. “It’s always one step at a time and we took a step this year. Hopefully we can use this to take another step.”

A late surge by Pella has Clear Creek Amana looking ahead to next season rather than the next round.

Pella (40-7) overcame a 7-3 deficit in the fourth set to earn a 25-18 win and scored the final four points of the fourth set to advance to the 4A semifinals against eighth-seeded Sergeant Bluff-Luton (22-13) on Wednesday at Noon.

Clear Creek Amana closed the season 37-8 and is already thinking about a return trip next season.

“It was a good experience and it’s definitely going to make them more hungry,” Clear Creek Amana coach Jackie Clubb said. “We are going to come back ready to go next year.”

Two years ago Clear Creek Amana made a Cinderella run to the 4A title game in its first trip to state since 2014.

The Clippers used the experience from that run to post an unbeaten regular season and reach the 4A semifinals last season.

With seven players form its rotation set to return next fall Clear Creek Amana hopes to follow a similar path a year from now.

“We wanted to get this experience under our belt for those kids that are returning and that will be really big for them,” Clubb said. “We know what the standard is and we have to reload.”

Clear Creek Amana appeared early to be on its way to the semifinals.

The Clippers won the opening set 25-19 and bounced back from a 25-22 in the second set with a convincing 25-20 win in the third.

Clear Creek Amana led 7-3 early in the fourth set before Pella turned it around.

“We got into a rut,” Henderson said. “They got on to a run and we lost our momentum and it stayed that way the rest of the game. It was really bad timing,”

Pella rallied to win the fourth set and shook off a slow start in the fifth.

Clear Creek Amana led 3-1 following an Averie Lower kill but the Dutch scored five of the next six points to take a 6-4 lead they would never give up.

“The state tournament is crazy,” Clubb said. “You can plan as much as you want but you can’t simulate that environment and that situation.”

Lower had a team-high 20 kills while Elizabeth Timmerman had 10 kills and Sariah Sherman had seven.

Those three juniors all are set to return next season along with Henderson who had 41 assists on Monday and sophomore Bailey Simpson who had five kills and four blocks.

“I’m really proud,” Lower said. “We have so many underclassmen and so many seniors that stepped up from last year and I couldn’t be more proud of our team.”

Katie Scheckel had a match-high 23 kills to lead Pella while Emma Eekhoff had 11 kills and Abbie Brand had 11 kills.

“Of course we wanted to win it but a lot of people didn’t even think we would make it this far,” Henderson said. “It was an amazing accomplishment to make it here, of course we wanted to win and we are disappointed but we are proud of what we’ve done.”

Pella                                           19  25  20  25  15

Clear Creek Amana              25  22  25  18   9  

Pella (Kills-aces-blocks)

Brooke Schulte 3-1-1; Elah Hiemstra 1-2-0; Katie Scheckel 23-2-1, Kelsey Tauke 6-0-1, Saige DeJong 0-1-0, Sydney Namminga 4-0-1, Emma Eekhoff 11-5-4, Abbie Brand 11-0-4, Claire Smock 0-1-0, Totals 59-12-12.

Assists – Katie Scheckel 25, Emma Eekhoff 16, Claire Smock 9, Abbie Brand 1, Saige DeJong 1, Brooke Schulte 1, Elah Hiemstra 1

Clear Creek Amana (Kills-aces-blocks)

Kylie Koehn 0-0-0, Elizabeth Timmerman 10-1-1, Olivia Webb 0-0-0, Kendall Ronnfeldt 0-2-0, Bailey Simpson 5-1-4, Emily Henderson 3-2-2, Julia Schlarbaum 1-0-1, Sariah Sherman 7-0-3, Averie Lower 20-3-3, Totals

Assists – Emily Henderson 41, Julia Schlarbaum 1, Kendall Ronnfeldt 1

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