Jay grounds Jets

MONROE — Abby Wendel picked the perfect time to have her best outing.
The Jay County High School junior notched a season-high 14 kills as the Patriots swept the Class 2A No. 4 Adams Central Flying Jets, 25-20, 25-15, 29-27.
“I just played,” said Wendel, finding it difficult to explain her best showing of the season.
Jay County coach Fred Medler was more descriptive.
“She had 14 kills for us tonight and she doesn’t normally have 14 kills,” he said. “She did what we worked on (in practice Monday), and for her sake that was huge.”
Leading two-games-to-none and three points away from victory, Jay County (15-2, 3-0 Allen County Athletic Conference) wasn’t able to put the match away.
Adams Central (9-3, 2-1 ACAC) scored three straight points to tie the game, but a pair of attack errors put them one point away from defeat. A kill by Haley Gross and mishap on the Patriots’ block attempt knotted the score at 24 apiece.
The new conference rivals traded the next six points before a service error by the Jets put Jay County up 28-27. Wendel then blocked a spike by Jenni Baumer, and on the ensuing possession for Jay County, she hit off the Adams Central block for a side out, sealing the victory.
“Unfortunately for that AC girl, the serve miss was big,” said Medler, whose team has beaten two ranked opponents, with its only losses coming to Delta and Wes-Del, currently the top-ranked teams in 3A and 1A respectively. “That gave us a window (and) Wendel was on fire the whole game.”
Wendel’s previous season-high in kills was 10, which she set in the Sept. 4 upset of Wapahani, then the seventh-ranked team in Class 3A.
“This is one of the best Jay County teams I have seen in all my years,” said ACHS coach Ashley Beard, a 2006 Adams Central graduate. “I played them four years and I started coaching right after. It is definitely the best team I’ve seen from them in a long time.
“I’m happy for Fred because I think he has a real good group of girls.”
In the opening game, Jay County and Adams Central traded runs of three and four points respectively. The Patriots went on a 13-6 run behind kills from Abby Barcus, Bre McIntire and Kylie Osborne. Adams Central got back in contention, cutting the deficit to two, 16-14, on a kill by Whitney Peterson, who then helped Baumer get two straight blocks.
“Whenever we blocked them it seemed like they didn’t get it back over,” Beard said. “We had probably 10 plays where we block-killed them, and I felt those were pivotal moments for us to make a run but we didn’t take advantage of it.”
Not only was Adams Central unable to feed off the blocks from its front row, the Jay attackers adjusted, mixing in tips and spikes to force the Jets’ defense into making plays.
A kill by Barcus gave Jay County the serve back, and neither team was able to keep it during the next four points. With a 20-18 lead, back-to-back kills by Osborne and Wendel put the Patriots three points from victory in game one. Adams Central capitalized on a pair of errors to get back within two, 22-20, before Osborne shut the door with two straight kills.
“That is a big opening game for us,” Medler said. “Then we come back and took them apart in game two.”
Back-to-back points by Adams Central in the second game tied the score at five, but Jay County went on a 10-1 run on the serves of Michelle Wellman and Ava Kunkler.
Wellman, who toed the line in place of Wendel, served the Patriots to five straight points, including one that hit the net and fell in front of the Jets’ defense. She finished a perfect 13-for-13 from the service stripe with two aces.
“She stepped in there and did a really great job in that serving spot,” Medler said of the senior. “She had some really tough serves and they had trouble handling it in game two.
“I don’t think we win without her serving the way she did in that spot … at least not in three (games).”
Adams Central was able to stop the bleeding briefly, scoring four of the next five points, but consecutive aces by Osborne shifted momentum back in favor of the Patriots.
With the victory over Adams Central, Jay County is now in the driver’s seat to make a run at the ACAC regular-season title, and Wendel believes her team has a shot.
“We knew that (Adams Central) was going to be one of our bigger competitors in the conference,” she said. “Knowing that we can beat them, the fact that we beat Heritage at their tournament and now we have Leo (Thursday), we know we can compete in this conference and we definitely have a chance.”

Junior varsity
After winning the first set 25-17, Jay County’s junior varsity team wasn’t able to put away the Jets, dropping the final two games 25-14, 15-11.
Britlyn Dues led the Patriots with 11 kills, and Emilie Walter chipped in with six. Kaelyn Weaver and Audrey Shreve both tallied three kills, and Alli Campbell had a team-high 20 assists.
Defensively, Hanna Ault led Jay County with five digs.