The Oak Park-River Forest girls volleyball team learned the importance of the setting position the hard way.
A variety of circumstances sidelined the program's top three setters for Tuesday's match and the result was predictable. The Huskies couldn't keep up with highly-regarded York and lost 25-11, 25-9 in West Suburban Conference Silver Division action in Oak Park.
Senior setters Jillian Briner and Rachel Smylie are serving suspensions, while junior Katy Oldach sat out with an ankle injury suffered in practice last week. That forced Huskies coach Don August to call up freshman setter Amy Schembari from the sophomore squad to start the varsity match.
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Schembari performed credibly, but the Huskies (11-10, 2-2) played considerably less than their best as a team.
"She did a pretty good job," August said. "I thought she did a very credible job. Unfortunately she didn't get a lot of support tonight. We didn't play with the intensity or the execution like we should. It wasn't the setter's fault. It was other players' fault."
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Schembari learned Friday she was going to start the match. The freshman collected nine assists in her varsity debut.
"I was really nervous," Schembari said. "Three points in I started getting into it better and I wasn't scared."
It was going to be tough for OPRF to seriously challenge York (25-3, 4-1) no matter who was setting, but the Dukes took advantage of the situation. They were able to put up a formidable block to the point of regularly forming a triple block. That didn't leave much room for the Huskies to hit the ball.
"Oh, they were good," Schembari said. "They could block."
York registered nine blocks on the night. Sam Schrenker recorded six of them.
"Jill (Briner) is their main player," said Schrenker, who noted how easy it was to set up a block in her absence. "We were hoping she would be playing."
York scored the first three points of the match and then rode a nine-point run to a 13-2 lead. Late in the game, the Huskies scored six of seven points to pull within 21-11, but the Dukes responded by posting the next four points to win the opener.
York scored the first three points once again in Game 2 en route to leads of 6-1 and 10-3.
OPRF made a mini-run at the visitors. Haley Edwards ripped off a kill from the right side and then served an ace to bring the Huskies within 14-8.
From there, though, York scored 11 of the next 12 points, including the final eight, to seal the sweep.
Anna Munz topped the Huskies in kills with three.
"York's a good team, a very good team," August said. "But at the same time we should have challenged them a lot better.
"Teams run through rough patches," he added. "We'll get through this and move on."
