Every serve, every spike and every dive brings the volleyball teams closer together. This season has not been easy, but through determination and teamwork, both the varsity and JV squads have continued to grow stronger with each game.
The volleyball teams practice every day after school, and every Friday they have an early morning practice.
Sophomore Taylor Osborn, a member of the varsity team, enjoys the benefits of early morning practice.
“I like it because we get to go home after school, and we get to get ready for the football games,” Osborn said.
Senior Molly Marteney, a member of the varsity team, finds importance in the team drills completed during practice.
“I like the drills that we do, but they can be very hard,” Marteney said. “We don’t do a lot of conditioning outside of it, so, because we don’t do a lot, we just can’t really be spending our time on conditioning, so we incorporate it into the drills.”
Freshman Keira Ware, a member of the JV team, participates in drills that involve both hitting and defense during practice.
“It’s constant movement,” Ware said. “There’s no sitting; there’s no standing, and we’re all hustling at every given moment.”
To Osborn, drills require effort from team members and can provide benefits.
“You definitely have to be very active,” Osborn said. “It’s just been a good thing; it’ll teach you communication.”
Even with the hard work the varsity team has put in, the players have struggled to obtain a good record this season.
“Our record’s not very good, but we definitely do put up a fight, and we have the potential to be there,” Osborn said.
The JV team has also struggled this season.
“The season has been pretty rough, but for how young we are, we’ve been doing pretty good, because most of our team is freshmen and sophomores,” Ware said.
Despite both teams’ struggles, they continue to practice and put in work for their skills to improve.
“With only having two varsity returners, there’s a lot of work to be done,” Marteney said. “We’ve just been working hard every day to build that up a little bit.”
The varsity team is comprised of four sophomores, four seniors and one freshman and junior. Junior Chloe Wignall finds difficulty being the only junior on the team.
“I don’t really have anybody that I grew up with,” Wignall said. “I’ve had to make friends with upperclassmen and lowerclassmen.”
Outside of games, the team can be found bonding with each other.
“One of the most fun parts about the season is that we get together,” Marteney said. “We spend a lot of time outside practice, and we have team dinners a lot.”
The team encourages students to watch the games and show their support.
“It’s very different than a lot of other sports,” Marteney said. “It’s very fast-paced, and I find a lot of people like watching it just because of the unpredictability of it. I would encourage everyone to go watch.”
