ROCKFORD, Ill. - The third-ranked Iowa Central volleyball team moved to 4-0 with two more victories here Saturday.
After besting Rock Valley and Grand Rapids on Friday, the Tritons scored wins over Terra State (25-20, 25-11, 25-22) and Waubonsee (20-25, 26-24, 25-15, 28-18).
"This weekend's tournament was a premier tournament with seven of the Top-8 ranked teams in attendance, as well as many other top teams, including seven from our conference," Iowa Central head coach Sara Horn said. "For us to come out 4-0 after playing the teams who finished ninth and 10th last year at nationals, as well as a Top-10 D3 Rock Valley and a scrappy Waubonsee team, says a lot about our tenacity.
"We were pretty tired for our last match of the tournament, so we really had to dig deep and rely on some non-starters to come into the match and give us some big points."
Katilyn Steffes and Haley Alharithy both hit double figures in kills. Steffes had 17 and Alharithy 10, with Brooke Dobson adding six. Molly McCauley had 35 assists, Bailey Dugan 11 digs and Jori Hajek nine digs.
Alesha Johnson added eight digs, Steffes had seven and Baylyn Johnson six. McCauley also had four kills, Johnson two and Hajek one.
After dropping the first set and pulling out the second, Iowa Central (4-0 overall) got past Waubonsee. Dobson had 11 kills, Steffes nine, Alharithy and McCauley four, Dugan and Hajek three, and Alesha Johnson two. Johnson also had 32 assists and 13 digs.
Baylyn Johnson had 22 digs, Dugan 19, Steffes 14 and Hajek 11.
"I was really proud of the way our girls battled physically all weekend," Horn said. "Our first contact was really good, so I'm excited to build off of that and get our offense rolling even more.
"Our sophomores did a great job in establishing their roles. We had some really big performances this weekend from true freshman Brooke Dobson, Michaelah Petrowiak and Jori Hajek. You wouldn't have known they were freshmen with how they played, especially in the big games, and that was really great to see."
The Tritons play at Hodges Fieldhouse for the first time Tuesday night when they host Briar Cliff JV at 7 p.m.