I haven't forgotten about this blog

Did you miss me?

I knew I hadn't posted on the blog in a while, but I didn't realize it has been almost three weeks. Yikes. To give you an idea of how long that is, the Patriots lost twice since I posted last. That is a long time.

I left off after summing up our tournament and the exciting run to the championship. The girls had a quick turn-around after the big victory with a game against Bishop Noll on the following Monday. Bishop Noll is a good-size IHSAA school with a pretty good volleyball team. I think the effects of the draining weekend showed in the first set. They had a hard time getting their offense going, which set up their big hitter. The score was even early, but BN got rolling behind their hitter, outscoring the Patriots 6-1 to take a 19-13 lead. As quickly as they got behind, CCS tied it up, scoring six straight by three kills by Ally and three unforced errors by BN. It stayed very close but at 25-25, Mandi put on down. BN followed with a kill attempt that went into the net and the nailbiter was Calumet's, 27-25. Set two was no contest, with the Patriots jumping out to a 8-1 lead and never looking back in the 25-8 victory. Set three, as predicted by Ted, was in between the first two. CCS had a small early lead, kept it and eventually secured the set and the match, winning 25-20.

Crossroad Crusaders came out to Lake Hills that Friday. We hadn't lost to them, but the last two years the games have been very competitive. Calumet beat them 25-22, 25-21 in the championship game of our tournament, which was the last time we faced them. In the first two sets, CCS had the lead late but couldn't hold it. In the first set the lead was 20-19.  Crossroads scored five of the next six. Ally kept us alive with a kill, but their big hitter crushed one to end it, 25-22. The lead late in set two was 22-20. Crossroads exploited the holes with dink kills as well as one big kill, and agains scored five of the next six, finishing the 25-23 set win with another dink. The Calumet serve received just fell apart in the third set. Crossroads also started going outside to their other hitter as we were having some success blocking their star, and we had trouble getting the block outside in time. We were in the game until at 12-12, but the Crusaders really got on a roll, outscoring the Patriots 10-1. Toward the end of the run our girls were really on their heels as they hit consecutive kill attempts into the net. Finally Olivia and Lee stopped the run with a block, which Ally and Olivia followed with kills and it was 22-16. But Crossroads scored twice, and then after two hitting errors, the star clinched it with a big kill and the girls had lost their first three-set sweep all year.

It may be uncharitable to say CCS went from the sublime to the ridiculous, to paraphrase Thomas Paine, but it fits so I'm sticking with it. I wasn't there, and the reports are that they were very nice girls, but the Gary West Side players were not very good and CCS rolled to an easy 25-8, 25-9, 25-4 victory on the following Monday. At least it was a workout before the Dayspring Classic, more commonly known as the Quentin Road tournament.

Ah yes, the QR tournament. After the requisite arm-in-arm skipping up the driveway (When did that start? Does anyone know?), the girls got down to business. I will summarize here because there was a lot of play to recap. Romeoville was the first opponent and they didn't last long, going down 25-4, 25-10. Another IACS team was up next, Berean of Rockford and they also went down with much of a fight, losing 25-9, 25-10. A couple of highlights: on one blast from Ally, the Berean player just ducked. I don't know if I blame her. Also, the girls felt confident enough to try some new stuff. Ally pounded one down on a slide. I don't know if Coach saw it - don't tell her! She thinks they're dangerous. Mandi also had a huge hit in this match. Grace gave us a good set to open the next pool play match. Grace stay right with the Patriots, pulling to within 21-19 on a kill. Two error followed by two kills by Ally ended their upset hopes and they went down somewhat weakly in the second, 25-9. Beth Haven of Michigan was the last pool play opponent. I was talking to one of the dads and found they had lost only one game before the tournament. They weren't bad, just not in Calumet's class and never threatened CCS, losing 25-14, 25-10. That made the fourth straight year of perfect pool play at QR by the Patriots, matching their record at their own tournament.

Saturday's first opponent in bracket play was the hosts, the Quentin Road Christian Eagles. As has been their pattern, the girls were sluggish in the (relatively) early morning match, but they methodically built leads in both sets and won both by the same score, 25-15. Our old friends, the Minutemen (Minutewomen?) of Calvary Academy out of Butler, PA was our next opponent. Six years ago they beat Calumet in the championship of this tournament. We had seen them once or twice since then, but they have never had a team since to compete with that one. This year was not an exception. They had one middle hitter that was very good and one that was pretty good, but they had a couple of fifth-graders that got significant playing time, who were in over their heads. Calvary committed a lot of errors to enable CCS to eventually build a 20-10 lead, and they cruised to a 25-16 set one win. Set two started similarly with Calumet going out to an 18-11 lead, but Calvary scored nine of ten to take the lead at 20-19. Olivia decided enough was enough, and she scored four kills in the Patriot six-point run to finish the set and match. Maranatha Baptist was our semifinal opponent. They were very tall and looked imposing. Calumet started very strongly, eventually going up 19-8 behind solid hitting from everyone. Maranatha made a little run, mainly because we had trouble with serve receive again. They got to with five, but Calumet scored the last four, the last on an ace from Ally to win set one 25-16. We committed more errors than usual to open set two - bad serves, hitting into the net, etc. - and could not pull away. At 12-12 Mandi scored two straight aces and it looked like the Patriots were back in control. An Olivia kill made it 20-16, but serve receive just fell apart again. Maranatha scored eight straight because of that and CCS hitting woes. They muffed one, but then the Patriots again couldn't handle a down ball, so we went to the third set. Maranatha's tall girls opened up hitting strong and a couple of hitting errors hurt CCS as well, but they were only down 7-6 when the Patriots really dialed up their intensity. A couple of Olivia aces contributed early in the run, then consecutive kills by Ally, Mandi, Faith and Stephanie ended it at 15-7, and the Patriots were in the finals again, for the seventh time in the last eight years. A chance to match the record in the Calumet tournament of four straight wins. Also a chance to become the first team to win four straight at QR ever in its 20-year history.

Nazareth Academy, a team from downstate Indiana would be the opponent. By this time, it wasn't a surprise, since we had watched most of the teams over the two days of the tournament. But if you would have told me before the tournament that Nazareth would have been our opponent in the finals, I would have asked you if the other teams had gotten food poisoning. In other words, they have not been very good in prior years, in fact, quite weak. This year they had two smaller girls that could really play. Their defense was solid and the fact that they had two go-to hitters separated them from most of the teams at the tournament. However, it was evident that they were not used to playing on such a big stage in front of so many people. The match started with four straight hitting errros by NA, three too long and one into the net. Ally tipped an overpass, then Nazareth put another ball into the net. Mandi then stuffed one. 7-0, CCS. Nazareth decided to try to settle down by dinking and it was effective. Later, following a huge Ally hit, we put one into the net and NA was within four at 11-7. They tried hitting again and it still wasn't working, as they hit three straight out at one point and CCS stretched out the lead to 18-8. Our girls started having some hitting troubles at this point, but NA couldn't take advantage. The score was 22-14 when Ally put two down. They did get a kill, but fittingly, they hit one out on set point, and CCS was one set from the championship. Both teams played better in the second, but as NA's hitting got better, so did our blocking. Olivia and Stephanie combined on a block to tie it up at 6. Two dink kills and an ace (serve receive issues again) and Nazareth led by three, but that was the last time they would lead. Kills by Ally and Olivia followed a serving and hitting error by Nazareth to give CCS the lead. We hit one long to let NA tie it up again. The lead was one or two until at 13-12 CCS, Nazareth's hitting woes returned, hitting two out. Ally followed with a kill to make the lead four. We hit one wide, but that was momentary glitch, because we followed it with a Faith kill, an ace by Mandi, and two kills by Ally, the second a thunderous one. (Thunderous - I don't think I ever used that term to describe a kill by her sister. So Ally's got that one on her.) After some back and forth play, Lee and Ally got kills to make it 24-16. We hit one out. Olivia then completed the championship run with a well-placed dink and CCS was champ for the fourth straight year (and fifth overall) of the Dayspring Classic.

Again, the Patriots follow a strong opponent with one at the other end of the spectrum. Last year the JV played Bowman Academy but this year the varsity had a hole in their schedule and so Coach scheduled the varsity to play. To use a favorite term of mine, Yikes. 25-3, 25-4, 25-7. Enough said.
The next four matches I was not able to attend. The first one was against Munster. Last year's match against Munster was the most frustrating of the year, not just because it was one of our two losses, but because we played about as poorly as we had all year and lost a close one. This year was different. Reports are that it was never in doubt, that Munster was the superior team and ended up taking the match 25-13, 25-16, 25-18. I'm especially sad I couldn't make the next one, as Coach told the girls played as good as they have all year, at least after the first set, and defeated Crossroads on their home court in five, 19-25, 25-22, 26-28, 25-22, 15-11. The next night was a trimatch with Goshen Blue Blazers and Heritage Christian. The girls won both in three straight, beating Goshen 25-16, 25-12, 25-15 and Heritage 25-10, 25-13, 26-24. Last night was the last home game and last regular-season match of the year. Before the match, seniors Stephanie and Lee were recognized and given flowers. The Chargers of Illinois Lutheran were the opponents. They were pretty strong last year, but lost many of their hitters and are in a little bit of a rebuilding year. The Patriots won pretty easily, even though they seemed a little sluggish at times. The significant element of this match was the number of blocks we had. I'm not absolutely sure, but this must have the most blocks we had in a match all year. The stats show we had eight which sounds about right. Everyone hit pretty well as well, and Illinois Lutheran had a lot of hitting errors. All three sets were pretty tight early - scores of 9-7 in the first, 9-8 in the second and 11-10 in the third - with CCS pulling away late.

44-5. Fifth straight year with forty or more wins and seventh in the last eight. I have been blessed to witness the last seven seasons For a volleyball fan to be a part of such a successful program, both in wins and losses and lives touched, it has been a real privilege.

Now we have a week off until the state tournament next weekend. Indy Silver Lightning looks to be the toughest potential opponent there. Then NACA. I hope we play Heritage of Maryland again. Here's why, from the Hagerstown Herald Mail:

"I am very proud of the whole team. They had to fight all the way through the tournament and they represented Washington County well,” Eagles coach Young-Sook Anderson said. “We were the newcomer, we’d never been there before, so nobody knew about us. All the coaches and parents there were shocked, they were all wondering where we were from. So it was neat because everybody was curious about us.”

“All the coaches came to me and told me Kara was the No. 1 player there,” Anderson said. “She mostly got defensive MVP because the offensive MVP went to a player on the winning team (Calumet), but she wasn’t as powerful as Kara.”

“The losers’ bracket tired our girls out because we had to play more games,” Anderson said. “Calumet had an easy road to the final, had to play less games and had more rest than us. They scouted us a lot, but we didn’t have the time to prepare for them.”

They seem to like sour grapes. Maybe we can give them some more :-)