Volleyball Recap!

First off let me apologize for the long time since my last post. Alot has developed so I'll begin where I left off. Way back on March 4th we played Gentofte, the only team to beat us since Christmas, who was also red hot and had won 7 in a row putting them in first place. We were looking for redemption of our previous two losses, the first a 5 set thriller in Middelfart and the second a 3-0 effort in Copenhagen. Alas, it was not the day to do it. We came out quite flat, actually getting aced on 2 of the first 4 serves. That immediately set the tone for the first set and we lost 25-13. We regrouped in the second sharpening up our passing, and using our middles to score and won 25-17. Gentofte then turned their serving pressure up for the next two sets and won 25-16, 25-22. The match was all about ball control, they served better than we could pass and they passed better than we served. It also helps when your best player goes 19 for 24 wit 2 errors! Their leftside was pretty unstoppable for us and something we'll have to work on if we meet them in the final.

Next, on March 15th we had a match again Ikast. This win would secure 3rd place going into the playoffs and proved to be a good test for us to stay on track. They have some good young players but we were hoping to exploit some weaknesses up the middle. The game was a less than outstanding match with both teams making lots of errors, making the flow of the match seem long and drawn out. Either way we walked away with a 3-1 victory (25-18,22-25,25-20, 25-20).

Finally, on March 21st we played out final regular season match at Holte. After already securing third place the results of this match did not affect anything, however it was a very good opportunity for us to sharpen up our offense and try different things. Most of the guys on the team trained hard right through the week with a few extra workouts to be able to taper for the semi finals. This meant we were a playing a little bit tired and sore. We came out firing right out of the opening serve. Both teams traded points until about 19-19 when we made a push to 23-. We sided out and won the set 25-20. The next set we came out a little flat and got down 4-0. Mizuno was forced to call a time out to get us back on track. We played from behind most of the set until about the 20 point mark where we made our push with aggressive blocking and defense. We took the second set 25-22. The third set was another great battle with both teams trading points in side out fashion. However our blocking forced Holte to commit a couple hitting errors late in the set and we won 25-22 completing the match and our regular season.

The second half of the season has been quite successful for us as a team. The season is broken down into three parts as you play each team 3 times. The first round we went 2-4, the second 5-1 and the third 5-1. We've been playing alot better which is to be expected when guys start to feel more and more comfortable paying with each other. Next up is game 1 of the semi finals vs Marienlyst on Saturday March 28th.