(The girls will start their first round of playoffs on Tuesday, Nov. 11, at 5 p.m. at home. Fans are asked to wear all-white clothing.)
Varsity volleyball had a long battle in their final match against Sacramento Adventist on Nov. 4. The match was two hours long, but the girls desperately fought every minute of it.
And it was worth it. The girls won 3-2.
“They are a decent team and we have to be ready to play,” coach Jason Kreps said before the match. “We should do just fine.”
In the first set, there were many tips from front-row players on both sides. SCDS won 25-15. SCDS was very enthusiastic and pumped up during their short break between sets.
In the second set, the Capitals began with a small lead. Eventually, the Cavs took it back.
In the middle of the game, the Capitals made a strong comeback by getting their passes in control and higher so their setter had enough time to reach them.
There was a real struggle for the few remaining points of the second set. Sometimes the Cavs would overshoot their passing, so the ball would land in another corner of the court. Cav players had to dive for the ball in order to get a touch on it. SCDS suffered some struggles at the net, so they were forced to get low and scoop the ball up.
The Cavs lost 19-25 and were much more serious upon returning to the benches. The SCDS girls seemed quiet in comparison with the boisterous Sac Adventist crowd, who celebrated their team’s win by singing and shouting. The gym was so full that some attendees sat on the ground or leaned against the walls.
In the third set, Sac Adventist had more hits instead of just passing the ball over. The Capitals didn’t get very low on defense, so whenever a ball came smashing at their feet, they would fall on their knees.
Sac Adventist’s setter had some very high sets, so SCDS’s players were able to predict where the hit would come from and adjust themselves accordingly. The Cavs had a 2-point lead for most of the match, but at the end the Capitals tied the score and gave a hard fight for the remaining points.
The teams’ coaches called four timeouts during the suspenseful final minutes of the set as the Capitals began to overtake the Cavs. The crowd went absolutely ballistic when SCDS lost 23-25. Students grabbed each other, stamped their feet and screamed their school’s fight song at the top of their lungs.
In the break between the third and fourth sets, SCDS team members tried to lift each other up by getting in a group huddle. They started strong and kept pushing for the entire match. SCDS players spent little time preparing for their serve possibly because the intensity of the crowd demanded a fast-paced game. The Cavs were great at regaining control of shanked balls. The Cavs had more than a 5-point lead for the majority of the match, and the Capitals were never able to kick it up a notch and catch up.
SCDS won 25-14.
The final set began with the teams tied, but SCDS quickly surpassed Sac Adventist and won, 15-5.
Aidan Galati showed no signs of the injury she received during the match against Faith Christian on Oct. 30.
“We could get pretty far,” freshman Katia Dahmani said. “It would be really cool to win the championship as a freshman.”
Usually SCDS makes it partially through their playoffs, but the girls have made it to finals only once.
There will be three rounds of playoffs before the section championship at UC Davis in late November.
