Riverside-Brookfield coach Caitlin Staib-Lipinski knows what it’s like to be on an elite volleyball team.
When she was in high school in 2004 and 2005, she played for Naperville Central and helped the Redhawks to a 70-12 record and the program’s first Class AA state championship before playing college ball at Bradley.
She knows what it takes to be a champion and has the opportunity to impart her wisdom with the Bulldogs.
“I’m trying to give the players my experience from that,” she said. “And they are really good listeners.
“I’m grateful that they are applying what I am teaching them. They trust me and I trust them.”
The Bulldogs enter this week with a 10-8 record playing a strong schedule.
They dropped matches to two-time defending Class 4A champ Marist, ranked No. 1 in the state by Illinois Prep Volleyball; Lockport, ranked fifth; Oak Park-River Forest, ranked sixth; and Belleville East, ranked eighth.
The team has a nice mix of youth and experience.
Through 18 matches, senior outside hitter Mackenzie Sloger led the team with 131 kills while sophomore outside Ella Wilkowski added 85. Senior middle Asha Ponnappan led the Bulldogs with 34 blocks, Sloger had a team-high 21 aces, sophomore setter Elsie Crist had 292 assists, and sophomore libero Sage Roldan had 122 digs and 145 receptions.
Staib-Lipinski is hoping that the Bulldogs can start to beat some of these elite teams. One encouraging sign was taking a set from Oak Park in a 25-14, 21-25, 15-12 setback on Sept. 11 in the Downers Grove South Denise Kavanaugh Invitational. Oak Park went on to take second and R-B finished fourth.
The Bulldogs also lost in a semifinal war to unranked Joliet West 20-25, 30-28, 15-10 and the Tigers went on to win the tournament.
Another good sign was the first weekend of the season when they played in the rugged 32-team Mizuno Crimson Classic hosted by Plainfield North at the Great Lakes Volleyball Center in Aurora.
The Bulldogs were seeded 25th, but they came up with one of the biggest upsets in the tournament on Aug. 29 when they knocked off No. 8 St. Ignatius, St. Viator and Metamora in pool play and qualified for the gold division before finishing seventh.
“I feel like we get underestimated because we are a smaller school,” Staib-Lipinski said. “But we work hard and we’re a young team.
“A lot of our girls have best friends who play at St. Ignatius so that was a good win. It was an earned win because it was a tough match.”