With help from Honkomp’s pancake, Rochester flips script on Triton

Bailon leaves with apparent knee injury in first set

BY VAL TSOUTSOURIS

Sports Editor, RTC

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Logyn Honkomp Amara Wieringa

BOURBON — Logyn Honkomp had never tried one in a match, but the Rochester senior libero went for it in the third set with her team leading 11-8 against host Triton in a volleyball match at the Trojan Trench Monday.

She went for a pancake.

Honkomp launched herself parallel with the ground and stuck the back of her hand out and somehow kept the ball from hitting the floor. The point ended with a kill from teammate Amara Wieringa, and Rochester won the next two points on hitting errors from Triton as well.

What might have been a close match was in Rochester’s favor the rest of the way, and they went on to win 25-9, 21-25, 25-20, 25-21 to improve to 6-1.

Freshman Makayla Walley led with 11 kills, Amara Wieringa had nine, and Adalyn Gonzalez had eight. Wieringa led with 23 digs, and the pancake was one of Honkomp’s 20 digs.

Wieringa and Emma Mathias had 15 serves received each, and Rilyn Strasser had 13.

“Tonight was just a weird night,” Rochester coach Laneia Strasser said. “I don’t know. There were a lot of momentum changes. We didn’t have as many stretches after the first set of momentum as we’d like to see. Just a weird night.”

But the bigger concern might be junior middle hitter Maddie Bailon, who suffered a left knee injury and needed to be helped to the trainer’s room with Rochester leading 18-7 in the first set.

Triton, who won 24 matches last year and who made it to semistate without losing a set in the sectional or regional, dropped to 4-2.

Honkomp’s heroics capped a 6-1 run that also included kills from Walley, who was back healthy after hurting her ankle at the Tomahawk Invitational Saturday; Sylvia McCall, who was filling in for Bailon; and Gonzalez.

A Brailyn Hunter tip ended the third set, but Triton won the first three points of Set 4.

Again, Honkomp stepped up, going on a six-point run with her left-handed, side-spinning serve that baffles opponents.

“Her serves kept us alive and that pancake,” coach Strasser said. “So we’ll take it. I kind of jumped into her a little bit and told her, ‘Come on, Logyn, you’re a senior. You’re a defensive specialist. Your job is to get a hand on every ball. Work harder.’ And she did. She started to work harder.”

Triton would make a final run to get within 20-18, but Hosannah Chupp missed on two kill attempts, and a Walley tip would get it to 23-18. The match ended on an Adylyn Stichter serving error.

“Very important,” Wieringa said of Honkomp’s pancake. “I feel like maybe if we didn’t get that point, it really would have probably set us back a little bit. I think that the hustle was there, and that made everything good.”

The Lady Zs jumped out to an 8-0 lead with Wilson behind the service line. Walley had a kill, Bailon had a stuff that Strasser set up with a flying dig, and Wieringa had a kill. Triton called a timeout before they scored their first point.

A Wilson tip between four Chupp hitting errors made it 17-5. Then Bailon got hurt along the left sideline.

“She said she heard it pop,” coach Strasser said. “She put a little bit of weight on it. I don’t know. I guess only time will tell. Hopefully, it's nothing major, and she’s back there on the court. She’s a difference maker on the court. You never want to see a girl get hurt, so too early to tell exactly what’s wrong.”

Coach Strasser praised McCall for her ability to handle the pressure after Bailon’s injury. She also praised junior defensive specialist Emma Mathias.

“Emma played awesome tonight,” coach Strasser said. “Emma played confident tonight. She doesn’t always necessarily get in those high-pressure situations, and she did, and she did great. She passed well. She brought the energy when we needed it because a lot of our seniors tonight and the girls that are out there in all-the-way-around rotations weren’t either out there or they don’t feel good. So she did a good job, and she stepped up as a leader.”

After Bailon’s injury, Rochester finished the set with four straight points, including two Honkomp aces.

The second set was tied at 3, at 4, at 5, at 6, at 8, at 10 and at 12, but a 6-0 Triton run helped take a 16-12 lead.

Triton would increase the lead to 22-16 after back-to-back Walley kill errors. A Gonzalez kill, a four-hits call on Triton and a Walley kill from the middle got Rochester with 22-19, but three Chupp kills would close out the set and tie the match.

“I feel like once Maddie went down, it was a little scary for us because we were a little in a disaster because she’s a great player,” Wieringa said. “But I feel like we stayed together, and we played together well. I think it helped us just to know that even though she’s not on the court, we’re still all one unit.”

Rochester def. Triton, 25-9, 21-25, 25-20, 25-21

Rochester stats

Aubrey Wilson – 17 points, 1 ace, 3 kills, 2 blocks, 33 assists, 12 digs; Logyn Honkomp – 15 points, 7 aces, 10 serves received, 20 digs; Brailyn Hunter – 10 points, 4 kills, 2 serves received, 1 block, 2 digs; Adalyn Gonzalez – 5 points, 1 ace, 1 serve received, 8 kills, 9 digs; Amara Wieringa – 1 point, 9 kills, 14 serves received, 3 assists, 23 digs; Maddie Bailon – 1 point, 2 serves received, 1 block, 2 digs; Makayla Walley – 11 kills, 2 blocks, 1 assist, 3 digs; Sylvia McCall – 3 kills, 1 block; Rilyn Strasser – 13 serves received, 3 digs; Emma Mathias – 15 serves received, 7 digs