Wolfpack Players, Coach Represents At All-Star Game

Four Wolfpack recent graduates wrapped up their high school volleyball careers at the Northeast Nebraska All-Star game today in Norfolk on June 9 at 3 p.m. The game took place at the Cox Activities Center at Northeast Community College. 

Grace Henn, Calli Krebs, Paige Meis and Nickol Payne all represented the dark team, which was coached by EPPJ's Tina Thiele-Blecher. The other six players consisted of Kylie Hammer from Wayne, Hannah Heppner from Stanton, Bailey Kraus from West Holt, Katie Pilakowski from West Point-Beemer, Bailey Schindler from Ewing and Logan Wemhoff from Humphrey St. Francis.

According to Thiele-Blecher, the team did the best it could for only having practices on Thursday and Friday for two hours each day.

“Some of them haven’t touched a ball since November,” Thiele-Blecher said. “And only after two days and four hours of practice, I thought they all came in and did really well.”

Thiele-Blecher said the Elgin girls played well in the positions she put them in that were different from what they were used to.

During the game, there was a point when all four were on the court at the same time, and Thiele-Blecher said she didn’t even realize it until later when she saw a video on Antelope County News. She also said how excited she was at another time when she saw three of them serve receiving.

“At one time, I looked up and I’m like, ‘Oh boy, all three Elgin girls are serve receiving, here we go!’” Thiele-Blecher said.

Even though the dark team lost to the light team in all three sets and a fourth for fun, 25-21, 25-21, 25-16, 27-25, Thiele-Blecher said it was still great a great day of volleyball.

“Yeah we lost, but it was still a lot of fun just to put the best players in northeast Nebraska on the court,” Thiele-Blecher said. “It was some good volleyball and a lot of fun.”

Thiele-Blecher said she will still be coaching in the fall, but she will miss the Wolfpack players she worked with.

“It was great just to get them on the court one more time,” Thiele-Blecher said. “I don’t think the girls realized just how much they mean to coach and how they become your family.”