Building blocks
Benet girls volleyball season sets gold standard
Over and over, the newspaper reporters and headline writers used words like "stunned." That made an impression on the Benet athletic director.
This is Gary Goforth's 30th year at the Catholic school in Lisle. Until last weekend, its girls volleyball program had never won a sectional or made a state finals appearance. As recently as 2005, the Redwings finished 8-27-1.
Jonathan Miano / Staff photographer
Courtesy of Jeff Jendryk
Prior to the Benet girls volleyball team's second-place finish at the Class 4A state finals Saturday, the highest state finish for a Benet girls team was the cross country squad that finished third at the Class AA state meet in 2006.
But this season expectations were high, and that's why press coverage from Normal was framed the way it was. St. Charles East came back to win the Class 4A title 23-25, 25-22, 25-19 on Saturday night at Redbird Arena. That ended a 40-2 season that saw the Redwings win their first 31 matches as well as the East Suburban Catholic Conference.
"I know they (finished) below where they wanted to be but still - wow - they're second place in the entire state in 4A," Goforth said Monday morning.
This was a team that entered the state finals ranked ninth nationally by prepvolleyball.com and 16th overall in the ESPN RISE poll. Last week seven Benet players signed letters of intent or signaled their decisions to play on the NCAA Division I level next season. Six senior starters - Jessica Jendryk, Brie Hucek, Ariana Mankus, Val Mattaliano, Natalie Patzin and Paige Vargas - were named to the all-conference team.
"I'm sure they're very disappointed in not winning the state title but they've got to see the big picture, too, what they did," Goforth said. "There's so many positives that came out of this year. They put Benet on the map in volleyball. That's how you look at it."
Second-year Benet coach Brad Baker blew away Goforth and assistant athletic director Marty Gaughan when he interviewed for the position. Baker, a teacher in Palatine who coaches the Lake Park boys program in the spring, went 35-4 in his first season last fall.
"I knew (Jendryk) was there, but I didn't know there was this much talent there. I knew it was a private school in a pretty good area of volleyball. But I mean they hadn't really done anything. They (had) never been downstate. They never even won a sectional championship before. They won a few conference titles," Baker said Monday afternoon. "I thought, you know, let's give it a shot. And after the first few weeks over the summer, I knew that we could be special.
"St. Francis is not that far away. All these schools in this area are very good. And I didn't think there would be any reason why we could not be better and (set) a whole new standard. Education is fantastic there, why can't we do the same thing but with volleyball?"
For Benet, the 40-2 mark in 2008 is believed to represent its most wins and fewest losses ever.
"We were all kind of bummed out about the loss but, you know, we made so much history this year," said Jendryk, an Illinois recruit and the ESCC player of the year. "You can't look back on it and not be (so) grateful for this season. We've accomplished so many goals."
By Sunday night Jendryk was already trying out for a Sports Performance club team. The next challenge for the Redwings will be sustaining their success.
"The youngsters are already taking up leadership roles. And they want to win it for us next year," Jendryk said. "So we're all gonna come back, hopefully next year, and cheer them on, 'cause we know they can do it."
According to the IHSA Web site, second place marks the highest state finish for any Benet girls team in any sport.
"It will be interesting to see what this does. I've been around here long enough," Goforth said. "We've been successful in other sports across the board and that doesn't necessarily mean you're gonna get players coming in next year. (They) still got to score well on their entrance exam to get in."
Either way all future Benet teams will be compared to this one.
"Sometimes in a program, it takes a class just to kick-start the thing and get it going," Baker said. "It takes a team just to show everybody, 'Hey, we can do this here and this is a reality.'"
