Just how good is the 2009 Freeport VB team?

Photo by Dave Manley
Freeport's Lindsay Ellinor reaches for a tip shot against Harlem's Katie Gray during the game in Freeport on Tuesday.

This year's Freeport volleyball team is a mystery to me.

I'm not sure how good this team really is, but fact is: the Pretzels are a match away from winning the program's first-ever sectional title.

Just like the 2008 team.

"People expected us not to do (well) and this feels so good," Courtney Lawson said Tuesday night. "It's just phenomenal.

Laura Witt added: "Everyone didn't think we'd make it this far. They ranked us low in conference but we came up and we got second in conference."

"We're back to where we were last year, and that just makes us want to push more," Lawson followed.

The Pretzels just a year ago was the best team I've seen. Better than Eastland (before it went downstate), better than Dakota (a team that nearly went downstate, had it not been for Eastland) and better than any NIC-10 team school.

The tandem of hitters Kelsey Hoefer, Courtney Shiffer, Karli Davis and Katie Norman were nearly unstoppable.

Hoefer was the conference MVP, Shiffer was just a step below Hoefer, Davis was a leading hitter in 2007 and could still be effective despite a foot injury that has hampered her to this day and Norman made big plays in the conference title clincher — the first of the program's in 31 years (1977).

And let's not forget about Caitlin Greene, who's probably the best libero in the NIC-10.

People say this a lot about her, but she's everywhere. She continues to make digs that I don't see other back row players make.

At least not at this level.

That team, despite all its talented players and promise, finished just short of a sectional championship after losing to Burlington Central — the same school that beat the Freeport softball team in a super-sectional the previous spring.

Greene's now a senior, along with Laura Witt and Lindsay Ellinor. Witt and Ellinor aren't bad in the back row either and both have some pretty good serves.

They've had to step up, sure.

But are they better and, hence, made the Pretzels better than a year ago?

No. Not in my view.

Hoefer is a better hitter than any current player. Courtney Lawson's solid, Witt has filled in nicely considering she's really out of position (more of a setter than hitter) and Paige Calow is still improving.

Calow and Shiffer don't compare currently. Former Freeport volleyball coach Rodney Pritchett once said "(t)here's not a better athlete in the conference this year than Shiffer" and I believed him.

Calow has a way to go to earn that distinction.

Hoefer and Witt are most comparable, considering both committed to Division I schools.

But Lawson does well enough to be compared to the hurt version of Davis. A healthy Davis is better though.

Defensively is where the two teams seem to parallel.

Greene has been the backbone of the defense for a while and I think this year people are starting to understand just how important she's been to the Pretzels since starting for them.

Witt has always been a starter, but her role has expanded this year and has excelled.

But bottom line: the Pretzels this year are not better, or as good as the 2008 team.

"I don't think anybody expected us to got out and tie for second (in the NIC-10)," Greene said Tuesday night. "And to get back to the sectional finals is just amazing."

The real focus should be that the Pretzels are doing as much about as much as the 2008 team.

And if the Pretzels win an upset against Sycamore, they'll be doing more with less.