Volleyball
It’s been extremely hot in the gym everyday of practice. It’s a few degrees cooler in there than it is outside but it’s still very hot! The nice thing about though is that we get a lot of water breaks. So, we’ve been doing a lot of the drills we did last year so far and we’ve also added some new ones. We are also still doing the plyometrics, weight lifting, running, etc. during practices. Personally, I think it gives us a bit of an advantage over some of the other schools who have an air-conditioned gym. We’re used to getting hot and the others aren’t… that’s not to say that I wouldn’t love having a cool (as in temp.) gym. *This entry is going to skip around a lot… so just get used to it* We had our first “game” which was a scrimmage against Waggener High last week. They only have 9 girls total in their v-ball program, which meant we played against their varsity team. We won the first game by a lot then lost the second, but it was close. They wouldn’t let us play another game b/c they had to cool off to play our varsity team. They [our team] won both games so we got out of there relatively quickly. We all then went to Arby’s…and of course I didn’t bring any money, and I hate asking for money. So both coaches were offering to pay for something for me to eat but I insisted that I was fine and quietly drank from my water bottle. After about 10 minutes of sitting with Jessica, Kendal, and Dana, our bus driver came over to me and offers me either a half of a wrap or a roast beast sandwich. I chose the wrap b/c I wasn’t very hungry. I ended up eating about half of the half … which makes ¼ … yay I can do math… lol. I gave the rest to Taylor b/c she really wanted it. So now we are back on the bus heading home and randomly the bus would kind of stall then go, then stall some more. Every time it stalled smoke would come out of the back of the bus… I’m guessing from the exhaust pipe. So we get to the ramp in Buckner and the bus just completely stops and smokes. The cars behind us (are probably quite angry) start backing up and then he finally gets it going again, yet we are still smoking a bit. We then have to stop at the railroad tracks ahead… after we started going again the bus wouldn’t stop stalling. So we kept giving off big puffs of smoke and then finally it was a never-ending trail of smoke. Everyone was freaking out b/c we were all in the back, which is where the engine is. We all enjoyed watching the drivers behind us reacting to all the smoke. When we reach the front entrance to the school the bd says he’ll let off some people and then take the rest to the back of the school b/c that’s where some parents were. We all looked at each other and got off the bus… most of us just walked to the back of the building. As I started walking through the outdoor hallway to the back I turned around and looked at the bus, and it wasn’t starting. So I was glad I didn’t stay on. The next day at practice we played a fun game. I think of it as a modified version of lacrosse. We get those scoops that a ball will roll in and off of and we divided up varsity and junior varsity. I tell you what; it can get pretty dangerous playing that. I play defense for my team and I try to knock the ball out of other people’s scoops before they can score a goal. When you hit the scoop you sometimes hit their hands… it hurts quite a bit… I’ve gotten hit a few times. Leaves a nice bruise. You also have to watch out for the ball. Coach Weires was being our goalie b/c we were down by about 5 pts. and he was trying to get the ball to me and it ended up hitting me in the face. It was all good though. We did get it away from the goal though. Also, right after they scored a goal, coach tossed me the ball and I started running to the other end… but no one seemed to notice. I got to the goal and dodged Kara and made a goal then ran back to defense. Coach congratulated me. That was fun. The final score of that was JV 10, Varsity 8… Heck Yes! Mon., Tues., and Wed. we did a few new drills that helped get us used to our new positions in a 6-2 lineup. It’s kind of confusing at first but it got easier. Oh, we also chose captains of both teams. Each player voted for 4 people (2 for their team and two for the other one). I thought it was funny b/c everyone that I chose, became captains. For the varsity it is Dani Weires and Amber McIntosh. For JV it’s Morgan Abney and I (yes I voted for myself. For one, I really wanted to be a captain and two; they never said we couldn’t vote for ourselves.) So that was exciting. We had our second scrimmage tonight (as I look at the clock and see it is 12:43…) ok, so last night I guess. We played against CAL (Christian Academy of Louisville), which is a good team. We lost the first game pretty badly. Everyone was getting discouraged so I was trying to pump them up and get them excited. It was funny b/c Coach W. asked us “Are you all ready to go back in there and win it?” and we all just kind of mumbled “yeah… sure”. I chuckled and said “Wow that was enthusiastic!” and I got some laughs. We got back out there and played very hard and won the game. This meant that we had to play a third game to 15. After a lot of hard work, we pulled off a win. So, I think everyone did an outstanding job. It really showed that if we all put our minds to it and hustled, we could do it. I think it will help us with future games knowing we’ve done it before and we can do it again. I was very proud of the girls on our team and I’m looking forward to our first actual game on Tuesday against Shelby County. That should be a lot of fun. Until then…goodbye.