Lions 15-1 veterans libero Sam Falk (32) from Mother McAuley and Oak Park-River Forest's Grace Nelson (29) are expected to lead 1st Alliance 16 Gold this season. (Photo by Dave Ruggles) The 2022 Windy City Power League seeding tournament starts Saturday at a number of sites throughout the Chicago area and we’ll get our first look at many of the teams listed here, but for now, it’s mostly speculation as we present our first rankings of the season. The 16’s rankings feature a number of teams that have undergone major “facelifts.” Ther...

Plainfield North's Ella Wrobel (88) headlines Sports Performance 18 Elite, which welcomes back four players from the team that was runner-up in the 18 Open division at the 48th AAU Girls Junior National Championships last summer. (Photo by Dave Ruggles) By Phil BrozynskiIllprepvb.com EditorAnd so it begins.We will get our first look at three of the top 18’s teams in the Great Lakes Region -- Sports Performance 18 Elite, VC United 181 Elite and Illini Elite 18 Cardinal -- this weekend when they scrimmage at the Great Lakes Volleyball Ce...

Lauren Coyne (far right) of Wheaton Warrenville South is one of the reasons Sports Performance 15 Elite should be one of the top 15's teams in the state this club season. (Photo by Dave Ruggles) The 2022 Windy City Power League seeding tournament starts next Saturday at a number of sites throughout the Chicago area and we’ll get our first look at many of the teams listed here, but for now, it’s mostly speculation as we present our first rankings of the season. The 15s are always the most difficult to predict for a variety of reasons....

Middle hitter Josh Weyerhauser (9) and his Adversity B18 Adidas teammates won the 18 Open Silver bracket at last weekend's 2022 Boys Winter Volleyball Championship at McCormick Place. (Photo by Dave Ruggles) Will it be the last “stay-cation” for several suburban Chicago and out-of-state clubs?The 2022 Boys Winter Volleyball Championship wrapped up Monday at McCormick Place, but at least some of the conversation over the weekend centered on the move by many boys’ clubs across the country away from the USAV junior national championship to...

St. Thomas More's Mallory Monahan (6) figures to add a lot of punch to Illini Elite 17 Cardinal this club season. (Photo by Dave Ruggles) The 2022 Windy City Power League seeding tournament for 17’s and 18’s is still two weeks away when we’ll get our first look at many of the teams listed here, but a few have already started competition and others will scrimmage this weekend at the Great Lakes Volleyball Center in Aurora.As has become the norm, the rankings feature a number of teams that have undergone major “facelifts.” There are also...

Teams like unranked Wheaton North will get a fresh start when the IHSA tournament begins tonight. (Photo by Dave Ruggles) Even if you were paying attention, based on the organization’s fixation on football you probably didn’t know there was an IHSA girls’ volleyball tournament beginning this week.A television show to present pairings? Endless tweets? Shutting down the website for an entire day so as not to interrupt people going to the website to check out the pairings? An early sneak peek for the press so they can beat their deadlines...

Barrington's Jessica Horwath (2) and the Fillies handed Class 3A No. 1 Belvidere North its first loss of the season Saturday at the Huntley tournament. (Photo by Dave Ruggles). (Editor's note: There will be no rankings Monday, October 18. The final regular-season rankings will run Monday, October 25.)The “rolling of the peas” took place Monday morning at the IHSA offices in Bloomington to determine the semifinals pairings for all four classes November 12-13 at Redbird Arena.No one should expect all the top seeds to survive their sectio...

New Trier outside hitter Julia Hall (12) tries to split a pair of Assumption (Louisville, Kentucky) defenders during last weekend's Asics Challenge at Mother McAuley. (Photo by Dave Ruggles) The Asics Challenge has come and gone. Mother McAuley and Marist met for the second time this season, albeit it for third place, not first, and the result was the same, although the rematch was much closer than the teams' first meeting. Not that there wasn’t any interest in an all-Kentucky championship match, but there’s something special about the...

You need to break out your yellow hardhats when your school's biggest rival shows up at your door on the south side of Chicago. There are a number of big games on the schedule tonight – Hartsburg-Emden vs. Jacksonville Routt as Stags coach Jennifer Hayes goes for win No. 700, Pleasant Plans vs. Springfield Lutheran in the Sangamon County, Tolono Unity vs. St. Teresa.Later this week, the annual Asics Challenge is scheduled for Friday and Saturday at Mother McAuley. The tournament has been the playground for Louisville Assumption, but it...

Marist's Kamryn Chaney (right) is back from injured reserve and was named MVP of the Wheaton Classic last weekend. (Photo by Dave Ruggles) So what did we learn last week?For starters, we learned that Marist, now that the RedHawks have senior superstar outside hitter Kamryn Chaney back off the disabled list, are every bit the No. 1 ranked team in Class 4A they were crowned in the preseason.Marist rolled through the Wheaton Classic field last Saturday. Eight-time tournament champion Benet Academy, which for some inexplicable reason was p...