Glendale senior girls volleyball team keeps up the positivity
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As the TVRA East senior girls volleyball season goes into its two-week Christmas break, three teams have risen to the top of the division, and two have settled at the bottom.
Glendale High School is in its own bracket with a .500 record after College Ave. senior girls improved to 3-1 with a 3-0 win over the Gemini in Tillsonburg (25-8, 25-15, 25-14, 25-16, 15-4) earlier this week.
Now fourth, with a 2-2 record, the senior Gemini improved after a slow start Tuesday, peaking in a long, hard-fought fourth set that featured huge digs, blocks and spikes on both sides of the net.
"I was hoping we'd take away that one set - we were playing really good in the fourth set," said Gemini power hitter Lisa Richter, who had the ball blasted at her at least twice during one long rally - and recovered both.
"She (McDowell) was so tall! She doesn't even jump," Richter laughed. "Insane."
College Avenue eventually pulled away to take the set, and completed the sweep, but the Gemini will take some positives into the break, returning Jan. 10 to host Huron Park and WCI on Thursday, Jan. 12.
"Our positivity is up, which is why we played so well," said Richter.
"It's just little mistakes, the little things that we work on in practice that aren't really perfected yet. That's why we're still working on it in-season."
The team lost focus in the fifth set, said Richter, a 15-4 loss, just one week after steamrolling Dorchester 15-1 in a deciding fifth set.
"The motivation was down... not as much concentration. Whenever we have a lot of motivation, that's when we play really well. We're cheering each other, we're gathering for a hug each time to congratulate. But when we stop doing that, that's when our spirits go down and we don't play as well."