Iron volleyball’s postseason push ended in a two-set match against the West Wildcats in the Sectional Semifinals on Nov. 5, closing Community’s 2024 campaign with a 29-9 record.

The Iron lost the first set 25-14, a score that head coach Ms. Christine Konopasek said could have easily thrown the team off balance. Instead, Community rallied, pushing the second set to a competitive 30-28 finish.

“All year we have been a team that fights and is scrappy and battles,” Konopasek said. “At this point in the season, when it’s lose or go home, you have to make a decision– ‘We’re going to fight or we’re going to roll.’”

In the Iron’s final set against the Wildcats, the coach said, “They chose to fight.”

Throughout the set, Konopasek said, the Iron demonstrated their resolve, refusing to panic over lost leads or minor errors, turning in one of their strongest performances of the season.

“We fought really hard and showed a lot of heart in pushing that second set,” Konopasek said. “There was a lot of grittiness,” something the coach said, that made the game so close.

The coach credited the Iron’s fans with spurring Community on. Where fan support had typically been sparse this season, Konopasek said, Community fans turned out to support the Ironmen at Normal West.

“Seeing that many people come out for a Community/West game,” Konopasek said, “was super encouraging. For the caliber of volleyball that [the girls] are playing, [they] deserve for a gym to be loud.”

Despite their efforts, the Iron were unable to secure the two-point advantage they needed to take the contest to a third set.

While such a close contest could be cause for frustration, Konopasek was proud of the team’s performance.

“If it had been 25-14 [or] 25-16, that would have been frustrating,” she said. “But it’s hard to say that I’m upset, or angry or frustrated with how things ended when I know that they laid it all out there.”

Knowing the team gave the ’Cats their everything, Konopasek’s disappointment, instead, comes from the fact the team’s time together has concluded.

“The frustrating part is just that the time is over,” Konopasek said. “So when people are like, ‘You know, sorry about last night, but now you have your afternoons,’ I don’t want my afternoon back. I’d like to be going to practice today.”

Practice, Konopasek said, had been the “highlight” of the coach’s day this season, as each afternoon, she was inspired by the Iron athletes’ “willingness to work.”

That willingness translated to game success this season for players like junior Maggie Michaels, players Konopasek felt were still getting better each day.

Leading up to the West game, Konopasek said, Michaels honed a deceptive roll shot, a tactic that proved effective against the Wildcats.

“Seeing that from Maggie,” Konopasek said, over the course of the season’s final week, was “an indicator of the effort that [the team] put[s] into getting better all the time.”

The team’s dedication to improvement, Konopasek said, was key to their strong finish, including a seven-game win streak before the Wildcats match. Among those victories was a decisive win over the Lockport Porters, a team that tallied just four losses prior to facing Community.

Even in the Ironmen’s losses this season, Community competed fiercely against top-ranked teams, going three sets against Mother McAuley (No. 2 in the state), Marist (No. 3) and St. Charles North (No. 6).

Marist ended Mother McAuley’s season before knocking off Normal West in the Super-Sectional on Nov. 11 (28-26, 25-14) to advance to this weekend’s State Semifinals.

The Redhawks will face the Lockport Porters on Friday at Illinois State’s CEFCU Arena on Friday, with the winner advancing to the IHSA Class 4A State Finals.

“We’re able to compete with anybody,” Konopasek said. “There were things that got better and sharper over the course of the season, but that is a testament to the fact that [the players] came in and worked and focused every day.”

It wasn’t just work ethic that made practice the highlight of Konopasek’s day, it was the roster’s camaraderie, something largely led by the group’s seniors.

Captains Mya Blumenshine and Sydney Janssen, along with Maia Olsen and Paytyn Grey, Konopasek said, set the tone for what it meant to be an Iron volleyball teammate this season.

Blumenshine and Janssen, Konopasek said, did a “really good job” in their roles, with Olsen and Grey helping bring “people in, [making the team] inclusive.”

The team’s inclusivity, Konopasek said, was evident in the way Grey supported freshman setter Evie Mounce, despite getting limited playtime.

Grey, the coach said, “was so great” with Mounce, despite seeing significantly less court time than the freshman.

“It’s hard to be a freshman on varsity,” Konopasek said, “and it’s hard to be a senior not playing. [To] be rooting [for] and having the back of this freshman… shows so much about Payton’s character.

“It’s easy to be selfish when you’re on the bench, and you’re not getting what you think that you maybe deserve, or definitely what you want.”

But rather than succumbing to frustration, Grey chose to uplift her teammates.

“She is an incredible teammate,” the coach said. “She is always engaged, she is always enthusiastic, and she cares so much about her teammates.”

Those are the qualities that Coach Konopasek said this season’s seniors personify.

“In terms of leadership, accountability and caring for the people around you,” Konopasek said, “those seniors are the epitome of what I want in Normal Community volleyball players.”

And while the coach hopes each season that the team’s graduating class leave the program having grown as players, as people, and enjoyed their time as Ironmen, she said the seniors embody the most important lesson she wants to impart: “At the end of your time, your job, more than any other job, is to be a good teammate.”

It isn’t a volleyball lesson, it’s a life lesson.

“You have to be a teammate in your relationships,” Konopasek said, “or at your job or with all these different things that come up in your life.”

Mya Blumenshine, Sydney Janssen, Maia Olsen and Paytyn Grey, Konopasek said, “those four kids are the epitome of what a good teammate is: they are selfless. They did such a great job this year. It’s going to be hard to fill their spots.”