Marquette’s Aspen Michelin, right, blocks a hit from Escanaba’s Katelyn Stalboerger during their volleyball match played at Escanaba on Tuesday. (Escanaba Daily Press photo by Austin Hemmingson)

ESCANABA — With a chance at the outright Great Northern Conference volleyball title on the line, Marquette didn’t waste it.

The Redettes came out aggressively and focused from the start, rolling to a three-set sweep of Escanaba on Tuesday night to wrap up the GNC title and spoil the Eskymos’ Senior Night.

The Redettes prevailed, 25-14, 25-16, 25-15.

Powered my sophomore middle hitter Seiler Hruska — who finished with 18 kills and 17 digs — MSHS (39-4-3, 8-0 GNC) controlled the match from the outset.

“It feels great (to win the GNC),” first-year Redettes coach Ann Crandell-Williams said. “It’s my first year in Marquette and I inherited this phenomenal, athletic, hard-working group of girls that were led by these really passionate seniors.

“What else could I ask for, right? This is one of their goals — they wanted to win the conference. Next week will sort of be the other half of our goals, going into districts. We would like to experience some success there, too.”

The opening set was tied 9-9 before the Redettes pulled away. An ace by Hruska made it 16-11, and shortly after, Maria Millado went on a four-point service run to increase their lead to 21-12.

“Having a hitter like Seiler makes it a lot easier to win games, but then we have these other middles,” Crandell-Williams said. “We passed great tonight, we have been serving to score, we’ve been serving strategically and we’ve been float serving, so we’ve been working on all aspects of our game.

“We knew Seiler would be strong coming in, so it was really about developing a strong team, because one player can’t win games.”

Esky (6-2 GNC) briefly had some life in the second set after back-to-back kills by middle hitter Nicole Kamin put the Eskymos up 4-1. But a four-point serving run by the Redettes’ Celinda Brunswick put them up 12-9. Hruska, Millado and Tellena Nystrom all served for short runs for the remainder of the set.

“Marquette’s a really good team,” Esky coach Adam Lambert said. “They always seem to bring it. We played them two weekends ago in Gladstone (in the GNC tournament) and we beat them in a set, and we stayed with them.

“We struggled (on Tuesday). Senior Night — it really gets to the girls’ hearts and emotions. So maybe it was the moment, but we certainly errored more than we have in a (match) since August…. We struggled fundamentally tonight to just keep our heads in the game.”

The Redettes jumped out to a 13-4 lead in the third set before Esky called timeout. The Eskymos pulled within 19-14 after a three-point run by Grace Charles, but Millado responded with a four-point run and the match finished on an Esky service error.

“They had some plans and they executed,” Lambert said. “I talked to their coach between the second and third set, and at that point she felt free to tell me what they’ve been working on, and it makes sense.

“They watched tape, they saw us accurately and they worked on it. We did some things in practice as well. We spent a couple hours just changing our strategy on offense to combat what we’ve seen from Marquette. They executed and we did not.”

While Hruska also had one service ace, Millado finished with 14 digs, four kills, three aces and two blocks; Maiya King 26 assists, six digs, four kills and a block; and Aspen Michelin had 10 digs, five kills and three blocks.

In addition, Nystrom contributed nine digs and an ace, Brunswick seven digs and three aces, Emilee Gooch three digs and two kills and Taylor Ragusett three digs and a kill.

The Redettes are off until they begin Division 1 district play next Wednesday at Petoskey against Monday’s winner between Gaylord and Petoskey. Esky finishes its regular season at 6 p.m. Thursday at home against Manistique.

Marquette won the JV match 2-0 and Esky won the freshmen match 2-0.