Ryan Murken

Your Prep Sports

SOLON – A regular season loss to Williamsburg cost Clear Creek Amana an outright WAMAC West Division crown.

Sharing the West Division title with Grinnell didn’t exactly sit well with the Clippers.

On Thursday Clear Creek Amana got some regular season redemption in the form of a WAMAC Conference tournament title.

Class 4A fourth-ranked Clear Creek Amana (31-6) avenged regular season losses to Williamsburg and Solon on its way to winning its second consecutive WAMAC tournament title and third in the past four seasons in Solon.

“I think for us our focus was more about making sure we could redeem ourselves against Williamsburg which we did and then we needed to redeem ourselves against Solon from when we played them at the beginning of the year,” Clear Clubb Amana coach Jackie Clubb said. “Those were our two goals and we were able to accomplish that tonight.”

Clear Creek Amana went 3-0 on Thursday, adding a semifinal win over 3A sixth-ranked Center Point-Urbana and closes the regular season on a 14-match winning streak.

“We worked hard on making sure we made some adjustments because we need to be firing on all cylinders in the postseason,” Clubb said. “I was happy with how we handled that.”

Clear Creek Amana swept Williamsburg 25-18, 25-14 in the quarterfinals to avenge a five-set home loss to the Raiders on September 22.

The Clippers then outlasted Center Point-Urbana 25-20, 14-25, 15-11 in the semifinals.

“We knew coming in that this tournament was going to be difficult because there are so many good teams so we knew we had to play well,” Clear Creek Amana senior Bailey Simpson said. “I was proud of the way we stuck together and played as a team and celebrated one another.”

Clear Creek Amana capped the impressive 3-0 performance on Thursday with a 19-25, 25-17, 15-9 win over Class 3A fifth-ranked Solon.

Solon won a three-setter over Clear Creek Amana in the only regular season meeting between the two teams back on August 29.

“We were definitely focusing on our side and what we can control,” Clear Creek Amana junior Schlarbaum said. “Solon did a great job with all their blocking and hitting so we were just focused on us and being good teammates and getting every ball up that we could.”

Solon (35-7) seized control of the opening set with a seven-point run that snapped a 10-10 tie and never trailed again in a 25-19 win.

Clear Creek Amana quickly regrouped.

“We talked about having more energy, I felt like we all kind of got down at the beginning of the first set,” Schlarbaum said. “We just talked about starting stronger and having lots of energy.”

The Clippers scored the first three points and never trailed in a 25-17 win in the second set.

In the third set Clear Creek Amana erased an early 4-3 deficit with a 4-0 run that featured kills by Schlarbaum, Simpson said junior Delaney Vaske.

“We definitely got better as the match went on,” Schlarbaum said. “They are really good blockers, they are really tall and they did really well but Payton did a great job of setting and we were able to hit over the block.”

Solon got as close as 11-9 in the third set but Clear Creek Amana ended the match on a 15-9 run.

“It’s very hard to win this tournament and that’s something that all the coaches knew coming in to this is it was going to be difficult for anybody to win it,” Clubb said. “You have to come ready to go, you have to bring your ‘A’ game.”

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