January 16, 2007 - Five carloads
of parents and players made the long drive from Ottawa to
Philadelphia,Pennsylvania - in amazingly warm, dry conditions for
mid-winter - to end up for a late dinner at the Hard Rock
Café before heading off to sleep and to prepare for play at
Temple University in the Martin Luther King Kickoff
Classic.
Due to the fact that our team was scheduled
to play in the afternoon wave of matches, Saturday morning was spent
having a leisurely breakfast followed by a team meeting, workout and,
of course, SHOPPING.
Emblazoned with maple leaf tattoos and
sporting Canada flags, the girls hit the court Saturday for the first
match of the day against the Liberty Bells 17 Blue from
Philadelphia. After some difficulty settling down, awesome digs
and smart hits soon had the set finished in favour of our girls by a
score of 25-14. Play in the second set didn't start out as
well, but the CAPS girls still managed to pull off a 25-22
victory.
A work term (scoring and doing lines) and a
break for lunch followed this game - time to get out of the sweaty gym
and eat some of the wonderful food picked up earlier in the day at the
Market.
The second match was against the
Marlston Storm from New Jersey. Our girls came out strong in
the first set and the opposition couldn't seem to keep up. A
string of strong serves and unreturnable hits quickly had the score at
15-1. Parents and players alike were thoroughly enjoying
themselves. Even Coach Matt had a big smile as a quick 25-9 win
ensued. Set two started a little rockier: less confident play on
our part, more luck on theirs. A beautiful kill to make the
score 8-6 seemed to inspire the 17U CAPS and they made the other team
work for every point, ending the set at 25-16.
Following another break, the third and
final match of pool play for the first day was against the Northern
Virginia Volleyball Association (NVVA). Observing this team
in warm-up, it was obvious that they would give the 17U CAPS a workout
compared to their first two opponents - a bit of a wakeup call for our
girls. Some strong effort at the net and on service soon had the
set at 20-7, but the opposition wouldn't quit and the set ended at
25-14. The last set of the match got off to a good start, but
quickly tied up and play remained neck-and-neck the entire time.
In the end the CAPS girls managed to pull off a 25-23 win, resulting
in a first place position in our pool (E).
Sunday began with a game against
Frederick VBC, the team that had placed 2nd in the A pool.
With a satisfying first 4 points scored against this strong-looking
group, focused play at the net - especially down the left sideline -
won the set for the 17U CAPS, 25-17. The second set was, at
times, a little too close for comfort, as play went back and forth,
and forth and back until an ultimate loss, 24-26. Neither side
wanted to give way in the third set, and the score was 7-8 at the
split. In spite of good defense by the girls from Virginia, the
17U CAPS managed to rally back to a 15-11 win.
With the schedule following the pattern of
the previous day, a shift working and a break for rest/food preceeded
the next match. Second in the K pool, the bright pink jerseys
of Keystone Jr EC (from the Philadelphia area), were hard to
miss. A strong start by the CAPS frustrated the opposition as
they pulled ahead to a 10-3 lead, but things soon evened out and the
final score for the set was 25-21. Several missed opportunities
by our girls had the other team in the lead for a short while, but
they came back from a time-out with renewed intentions and earned
themselves a 25- 21 second set victory.
After a second break, play began against
Synergy (a team from King of Prussia, PA) which had come first in
the F pool. It was not a good time to make mistakes, but some
very important blocks were missed and there were hole, holes
everywhere on the court, resulting in a 12-25 loss. The 17U CAPS
had an equally unfortunate second set ending at
12-25.
This placed us in a three-way tie for first
place in that day's pool play and resulted in an abbreviated tie
breaker - which ended in favour of Keystone 13-15, relegating
our girls to the silver bracket of the playoffs.
No rest for the weary, as Monday morning
had us moving to another and even smaller gym to meet a team called
Allegro. After an initial set that saw the CAPS come to
within five points of winning, much more consistent play allowed them
to pull ahead of the competition and stay that way to finish 25-16 in
the second. The tie-breaker saw determination on both sides, but
resulted in a 15-11 victory for our girls.
On to another gym - this time in a big
airplane hanger of a facility - to play against the Fury from
Long Island. Like the previous game, things didn't begin
auspiciously, with a 23-25 defeat, but the CAPS used some good hits
and blocking (especially the very tall girl) to win the next two sets
25-18 and 14-10.
They definitely had us moving! This
time we would get to play back in the big gym against another team
from just outside Philadelphia, Xceleration Elite.
Somehow the 17U CAPS girls rediscovered themselves - a
fact that was reflected in the high energy and exciting sets that
followed (25-16 and 25-20) to move them along to the medal
round.
The final game of the day had the CAPS
facing some strong-looking opposition in the form of the Yorktown
Tigers from Pennsylvania, but stronger play on the part of the
CAPS, both on service and at the net, had the girls victorious at
25-16. Way to play up! It was definitely gratifying to see
the enthusiasm back on the bench and the drive and the determination
on the floor. An equally hard-fought second set saw the score
tied at 11-11, but then the 17U CAPS girls just took off and slammed
their way to a 25-16 victory and a gold medal in the silver
bracket. Happy tears!
Now all that was left was the long slog
home through rain, fog, ice pellets and snow and back to the reality
of Canadian winter.
Thank you, girls (and Matt) for an
exhausting and exciting weekend.
Thank you parents for making sure that everyone had food, sleep,
showers, entertainment and got to the places they needed to be on
time. Thank you especially to Anne,
Chris, Dave, Lise and Tony for safe travel for our precious
cargo.
