By Kristi Nixon

Seniors Claudia Aschenbrenner, right, and Jaden Francis hug after a 3-1 loss to second-ranked Davenport Assumption in the Class 3A quarterfinal at Xtream Arena in Coralville. EJ Photo/Kristi Nixon

CORALVILLE — After receiving the Class 3A state participation trophy following a 3-1 loss to second-ranked Davenport Assumption, Osage senior Claudia Aschenbrenner had a lot to say to her team.

A lot of it had to do with the pride they should have in showing the community they could do something they were hearing that they couldn’t: keep the Green Devils state volleyball streak alive.

“That we were supposed to be here,” Aschenbrenner said of what she told the team. “Everyone was telling us that we were never going to get back here. We were never going to play back on this court, and we did. And, so I’m so proud of every single one of those people because we worked so hard. I don’t think people realize how hard we work in the gym, how hard we work out of season and the effort we put in, so I was trying to give them some support because there is going to be doubts next year about whether they will be back here next year and I said, ‘You deserve to be back here, and you deserve to get this trophy because this is yours. It’s not just mine, it’s not just the seniors, it’s yours.’

Senior starting setter Sydney Muller added, “Everybody doubted us. Everybody in our community the past two years said, ‘Oh, they are not making it to state. They aren’t make it back.’ Just for our senior class, for everyone to say, ‘You’re not making it back,’ And we were, like, ‘No, we are.’ Just to prove everybody wrong. It was to be like, ‘No, we’re making it to the state tournament.’ We made it to the state tournament, we took a set from them. We played our heart out, and we played the best we could and did everything anybody asked of us.”

After the 25-22, 19-25, 25-15, 32-30 epic match win for the Knights, there was no doubt that the effort of both teams was outstanding. Assumption went on to win the state championship with a sweep of Sioux Center.

“Tremendous, we bounced back from the first set,” head coach Bryan Tabbert said. “New place for everybody, but we got the pre-game jitters out and finally got into a rhythm and once we got there, the girls just kept battling all day long.”

The full story appears in the Nov. 9 print and online editions of the Enterprise Journal.

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