Backward state tournament

I think we won the state tournament tonight. How do you win a state tournament by winning the first game? By participating in an ICSTS tournament, of course! You should have the background on this by reading my post from earlier today. Tonight's activity confirmed what I wrote. First the sixth seed, Goshen, defeated the third seed, Faith Christian, without too much trouble. The the fifth seed, Heritage, easily defeated the fourth seed, Lakeland. The next round started out with Goshen playing the second seed, Clinton, and Goshen won in five. You might say, well, Goshen played over their heads and Clinton had a bad day, and you might have been right, had not Goshen had beaten Clinton twice already. But they did. So now there are three teams left: CCS, the first seed; Heritage, the fifth seed; and Goshen, the sixth seed. Perhaps the seeding wasn't quite accurate. Perhaps.

Only two teams are going to state however, so one more game needed to be played - essentially the state championship game, since I think it will be obvious that the two teams involved are the best in the ICST this year, once the tournament is over. We had beaten Heritage early in the year, in three straight, but the sets got progressively closer. Certainly over the season Heritage played us as tough or tougher than any other non-IHSAA team all year. Set one' tone was set early. CCS was down 2-1 when Faith went up for a big hit. Boom-boom. Big hit, big block by Danielle, straight down. Holly, who played great all night, hit one down immediately following, but Heritage had the momentum. They were placing hits and dinks to holes in the defense, and moved out to an 7-4, 8-5, then a 9-6 lead. Time to change the momentum. Kills will do that. Kill by Rachel. Ace by Taylor. Kill by Faith. Another by Rachel. Then it was Holly's turn. 11-9, CCS. After giving up a point on a setting error, the girls ripped off four more straight points. The lead never got less than three the remainder of the game. Rachel finished off the 25-20 set 1 win with a dink.

The girls kept it up to start set two. The lead was 4-1 when Heritage got back on track. Dink, spike, and another block on Faith, and it was tied. No team had greater than a one-point lead until two consecutive Heritage kills gave them a two-point lead at 14-12. Heritage began making errors. CCS scored five of the next six, four on Heritage errors. Heritage tied it up at 17, then the Patriots went up three on a Taylor kill and two Heritage mistakes. The teams exchanged kills, with one from Heritage pulling them to within two at 22-20. Faith then placed two nice kills where they couldn't be dug, and Ally then hit a downball that Heritage couldn't handle, and set two was in the books, 25-20.

Heritage came out a little off in the third. The Patriots outscored Heritage 6-1 to start the set, but five of the points were off of Heritage errors. Heritage went on a dink kill binge, scoring three in a stretch that brought the Defenders back to a 7-5 deficit. Faith interrupted their run with a kill, but then two errors by the Patriots allowed Heritage to get to within one. But then Taylor got a kill followed by a net violation by Heritage. Then a really cool point - Rachel shot out her leg on a ball that she couldn't get to any other way, and popped the ball up. Faith hit it up, then Amanda bumped the ball over. Heritage must have been a little flustered, because they ended up putting a hit into the net. 11-7, CCS. When the Patriots pushed the lead out to five at 14-9, Heritage called time. A bit later, a Heritage kill and block brought them to within two, but Holly stopped the run early with a nice kill. Finally, on a kill by Faith, Calumet finished the set and the game, 25-21.

Three closely-played games, not always pretty, but pretty entertaining. Heritage is a very good team and it's a shame that this game had to be so early in the tournament. I think we are going to see this as the game that really determined the state champ. Two games this week, Tuesday and Thursday, then the state finals next Saturday in Lafayette. Go Red!!