Fillies’ season ends with hard-fought loss

BURLINGTON — If it had to end, Iola coach Jeff Fehr was happy with the way his team fought against a top-five team in the state to end its season.
The Fillies lost to Santa Fe Trail in straight sets on Saturday in the first round of their sub-state tournament in Burlington. The game scores were 25-17 and 25-12, but the Fillies made the Chargers work for their points the entire match and rarely seemed over-matched despite the high quality of their opponent.
For Fehr, even the method of transportation brought back memories with his four seniors: Jaydn Sigg, Sydney Wade, Toni Macha and Riley Murry. Fehr served as the freshman team coach when the girls were freshmen.
“We took a van on the way up here and I had a few of them in the van,” Fehr said. “When they were freshmen, we took the van everywhere with only six of them. That was a nice thing to finish it with them back in a van since we spent their freshmen year together in the van.”
In the first set against the Chargers, the Fillies battled hard.
“The first set, we played as hard as we could,” Fehr said. “We didn’t quit regardless of score.”
Sigg started the match off with an ace and Iola built an early 3-1 advantage.
Santa Fe Trail roared back and grabbed hold of a 9-4 lead, but if the Chargers thought they were going to take the Fillies completely out of the match that quickly, they were mistaken.
“We hit the ball, we passed well,” Fehr said. “I would say that was one of our best games of the season, even though we lost.”
Iola continued to hang around the match and junior Chloe Gardner went on a three-point service run to cut the score to 19-13 with the help of a big block from junior Colbi Riley.
Santa Fe Trail finally went on a run to widen the margin to 23-14 and seem to put away the Fillies, but Iola wouldn’t quit.
Piper Moore went on a 3-point run serving to get the Fillies back within 23-17.
The Chargers ended the set with two-straight points and won 25-17.
The Chargers jumped to a 6-1 lead in the second set and although Iola continued to battle, Santa Fe Trail was too much to handle and the Chargers took the second set and the match, 25-12.
“They wanted to go out on their own terms and I respect them for that,” Fehr said. “We served well, we passed well and we hit well. We just ran into a team with a little more firepower.”
Fehr and the Fillies will greatly miss the leadership of their core four of seniors next season.
Fehr says he will be counting on next year’s upperclassmen like Katie Bauer, Gardner, Moore and Riley to step up and provide that same type of leadership.
“Piper will be a junior next year and we will have those seniors that are going to need to show a lot of leadership,” Fehr said. “We have some offseason opportunities and some club volleyball opportunities so hopefully they all put in the work.”