By Gabi Marrese
“Early on we identified a vision of what we wanted our team to look like: being a conference powerhouse, improving every day, and always giving a little extra whenever possible, be it energy, point scoring, or leadership. As such, our team culture was a definite strength for us,” senior Kristen Lane (Seattle, Washington) said.
The Logger volleyball team finished third in the conference with a record of 10-6, and an overall record of 15-9.
They might not have achieved their goal of conference champions but the team as a whole overcame unforeseeable obstacles that revealed the depth of the team. Their preseason started off on a good note, beating some strong California teams in the Cal Lu Fornia Invitational. The team was ranked number one in conference early on in season.
“We came into the season stronger and more powerful than we did last season. A lot of players really started to dominate their positions. It was very fun to see the transformation some players had,” Junior Moira McVicar (El Dorado Hills, California) said.
During the month of September, the Loggers won 10 of their first 13 matches. This allowed the Loggers to become one of the top eight teams in the region for two rounds before ending their season.
“Five of the top 10 teams in the nation are in our region. There is not a single tougher area in the nation to get regionally ranked. So we are pretty proud of that,” head coach Mark Massey said.
Unfortunately the second part of the season started off with many injuries and ailments. The Loggers dropped six of their last 11 matches, including a very close loss in their final season game in Willamette.
“I really believe that our team dynamics were rattled with the many injuries this season. These injuries required people to take on different positions, new roles as starters, and more responsibility. Not only did the injuries take starters off the court, but they also removed leaders from the court that our team relies on,” Senior Riley Lawrence (Henderson, Nevada) said.
On Saturday Oct. 26, Lane and Lawrence, two senior captains, played in their final match in the Memorial Fieldhouse as Puget Sound athletes.
“Senior night is incredibly emotional. The night honors four years of hard work, challenges, lessons, wins, losses, competition, road trips, workouts, practices, and friendships. The final game incited both happy and sad feelings since it’s been an incredible opportunity to have played, yet I am not ready to give up my identity as a volleyball player. However, playing in my final game at the fieldhouse is a memory that will survive much longer than my volleyball career,” Lawrence said.
“So much of what we do is built around where we do it, and as we were warming up I was thinking about how much success and failure those maroon bleachers have witnessed over the past four years. While it was pretty surreal to play my forty-eighth and final home game on that court, any anxiety was quelled by the overwhelming support coming from the team and our amazing fans,” Lane said.
As the team says goodbye to the two graduating seniors, they look forward to the offseason with the 15 returning players.
“Last spring, we had the most productive spring training season that I thought we had had in the last 10 years. It’s probably not going to be the case this next spring because we have a very big junior class, many of whom are studying abroad,” Massey said.
The coaching staff is working on ways to help the players studying abroad by supplying them with good workouts, technical improvement activities and to get them some volleyball reps on the road. The team has nine juniors, which means that they’re looking for strong incoming players next year.
“We also already have some very good commitments for 2017. Several of them are national class players in terms of what they have done in high school and club play. So we actually think it’s probably one of our most talented classes in the last 10 years. Which is good because we are going to need some help early out of that group,” Massey said.