The 2023 Hononegah girls volleyball team set the standard for teamwork
With 27 wins for the Rockton IL Hononegah Indians, they fell only two games short of making a state appearance.
Earlier this week the Hononegah girls volleyball team lost in the Sectional Semifinal to number 1 seed Libertyville, 2 sets to zero. Libertyville then defeated Gurnee (Warren) to head to the Super Sectional on Friday November 3, 2023.
Speaking with Coach Kaylee Libby a few times this season, she spoke of how the team has improved in communication and passing.
She also spoke about her four senior leaders: Emily Auestad, Alyssa Mohney, Anna Ptacin, and Haylee Lundberg. As freshmen, they had a large number of players with them, but some fell off and found other paths through their high school sports careers.
The sports world recently lost a legend in Basketball Hall of Famer head coach Bobby Knight. He was once quoted as saying "Your biggest opponent isn't the other guy. It's human nature." Well I’m only guessing, but if he had ever met these four young ladies he would have said they have overcome human nature and stuck it out.
These four seniors were part of an incredible time in Hononegah girls volleyball.
Here is just a small look at some of the numbers they were a part of.
- A 92% winning percentage, going 101-28 for their varsity 4-year careers.
- 58-8 in NIC-10 play, never finishing outside of the top two in conference
- Winning the NIC-10 title in the 2022-2023 season, going 18-0 in conference play.
- *Remember that the 2021 year included a shortened COVID season only competing in 13 total games.
Thank you to Coach Kaylee Libby and her entire staff for welcoming me to every game I was able to attend and providing me with whatever was needed. As Coach Libby says, "Its like a big Hononegah Volleyball family thing."
Thank you to Ames-Sports for the generous use of just a few of the 1000s of images of Hononegah volleyball and just about every other sport at the school. Please check out all their great images at https://amessports.pixieset.com/