Yorktown Sweeps Avon to Complete Perfect Season
Yorktown completed a perfect season in the Class 4A championship match, claiming its second title in three years with a 3-0 (25-16, 25-22, 25-21) win over defending-champion Avon.
The Tigers finish 34-0, making it the first perfect season since Cathedral took the Class 4A title with a 36-0 mark in 2015.
Yorktown senior Kenzie Knuckles closed out set one and the final set with a kill. She led the Tigers’ hitting parade with 14 kills and also had 10 digs. Kylie Murr led the Tigers with 18 digs.
Avon (33-4) had a lead as large as four points in set two, but couldn’t hold on. In the final set, the Orioles were tied at 7-7, but the winners recorded the next two points and never trailed again.
Abby Maesch led Avon with 13 kills and Ava Torrance had 18 digs.
The title marks the fourth in school history for Yorktown, which also won in 2000, 2011, 2016 and the first in Class 4A for the Tigers. Coach Stephanie Bloom also guided the team to the titles in 2011 and 2016.
The Orioles were seeking to join 3A winner New Castle as back-to-back titlists in coach Amie Sherrod’s first year. Avon also won titles in 2012 and 2013.
Avon’s Chloe Rickenbach earns Mental Attitude Award
At the conclusion of the state finals, the IHSAA Executive Committee, on behalf of Indiana Farm Bureau Insurance, named Chloe Rickenbach of Avon High School as the winner of the Class 4A Mental Attitude Award.
Chloe is the third Avon volleyball student athlete since 2012 awarded with an IHSAA Mental Attitude Award and the 10th student athlete overall. Academically, she ranks in the top 20% of her senior class of 825 students. Her academic record consists of multiple AP courses and participation in Project Lead the Way, a rigorous biomedical science program that exposes students to real-world biomedical challenges. She is also a member of Avon’s National Honor Society. Chloe has spent time volunteering at a local doctor’s office, caring for adults and children with neurological disorders, and is a guest reader at an Avon elementary school.
Chloe was also a starter on last year’s volleyball state championship team and a 2018 All-Hoosier Crossroads Conference Team member. She has ranked first or second in both digs and aces in 2017 and 2018, all after rehabilitating from a torn ACL her sophomore year.
Chloe is the daughter of Chris and Leah Rickenbach of Avon and plans to study Architecture at Ball State University where she has received a scholarship to play volleyball.
Each year the IHSAA Executive Committee selects a senior player who was nominated by her principal and coach and was determined to have best demonstrated mental attitude, scholarship, leadership and athletic ability. Indiana Farm Bureau Insurance, presenting sponsor of the IHSAA Mental Attitude Award in Class 4A Volleyball, will donate $1,000 to Avon’s general scholarship fund in the name of Chloe Rickenbach.