It wasn't a gold-medal performance, but finishing fourth at the 4A provincial volleyball championship left the Paul Kane Blues women's team feeling pretty good about themselves and their season.
"We're very proud," said captain Whitney Follette. "The last two years at provincials the team hasn't done this well. We've never been in the top four until this year. It's awesome."
It's the highest finish at provincials by a St. Albert high school women's volleyball team since the Bellerose Bulldogs placed fourth in 2003 as the tournament hosts.
"We deserved everything we got this year, especially what we did at provincials," Follette said of the two-time defending Metro Edmonton Premier Conference champions. "The girls pushed really hard. They really improved throughout the season. They were really committed to the team and they really wanted to do well as a team."
Follette, an all-star middle, and setter Hailey Lutz are the only Blues to play in three provincials in a row. Last year the Blues finished eighth after placing seventh in 2009.
"The difference between this year and the last two years is that we really focused on doing better this year than we did before. We practiced hard and focused on defence and offence and put them together. That's how we made it into the top four," said Lutz.
In Saturday's playoff round at Strathcona Composite High School the Blues dropped a 25-16, 25-17, 26-24 semifinal decision to the Scona Lords and in the bronze-medal final lost 27-25, 25-11, 25-18 to the Western Canada Redmen of Calgary.
"I'm proud of the way the girls battled," said head coach Stan Andronyk. "They came out and worked their butts off. They gave it all they had. They worked together as a team. They supported each other."
Semifinal sweep
Early in the first set against Scona, Grade 12 libero Jordan Greco hurt her right knee defending against a hard hit and spent the rest of tournament on crutches.
The Blues kept Scona's point runs to a minimum in the first two sets but were unable to generate much offence while falling behind in the match.
In the third set the Blues battled back from 16-4 deficit and tied it at 19 on a serve by Nicole Mirecki. They later rattled off three points in a row to knot it at 23, then pulled even at 24 before Scona completed the sweep.
"Coming back in that third set was a lot of fun. All of our heads were in it. We wanted it so bad," Lutz said.
The loss left the Blues 0-6 against Scona, losing 14 of 15 sets against the Edmonton public league champions.
"We've played them so much this season and we wanted to beat them so bad. We thought this was our chance today and we just couldn't do it," Lutz said. "They have awesome hitters. They're a great team and they deserved to be in the final."
Scona went on to lose the final to the Centennial Coyotes of Calgary 25-19, 18-25, 28-26, 19-25, 8-15.
Bronze playoff
In the bronze playoff that was played in front of pom-pom waving Paul Kane supporters who packed the stands, the Blues gave the Redmen a good scare in the first set while building a 15-11 lead. After the top seed at provincials jumped ahead 20-18, the Blues rallied three times from two-point deficits to tie it. A killer spike by Follette to cap off a long rally, highlighted by some gritty Paul Kane defence, put the Blues up 25-24. The Redmen replied with three in a row, including a hit that landed just inside the back line for the set-clinching point.
The Blues struggled to regroup in the next set while falling behind 12-3 as the Redmen ramped up their dominating hitting attack.
The third set was close until the Redmen scored four in a row to go ahead 16-13. After a crushing hit by Follette left the Blues trailing by three, the Redmen tacked up three points in a row on Paul Kane miscues to lead 22-16 en route to the victory.
"It was our last game of the season and we wanted to come out hard and do really well," Follette said. "For some of us it was our last game to play in a Paul Kane jersey and it was tough. I really loved playing volleyball for the school. It's been a great experience."
The fourth-place result equalled the provincial ranking of the Blues going into the tournament and their final position to start the round of 16.
"We're happy with fourth. It's the right ranking for us," Andronyk said. "We needed some breaks and we needed to play our best volleyball to hang in there with these teams. We did very well, we just didn't quite do enough. "
In Thursday's provincial opener the Blues failed to win a set in the best-of-three matches against Scona, Centennial and the Redmen in the top round-robin pool to determine the final positions for the round of 16.
"We just didn't push hard enough, I guess. We put up a fight but we were just not on our game," Lutz said.
Strong showing
In Friday's playoffs the Blues beat the Foothills Falcons of Okotoks in four sets and swept the Harry Ainlay Titans to advance into the medal round.
"We played awesome. Everyone was just so on their game. It was definitely a team effort," Lutz said of Friday's showing. "The teams we played on Thursday were the top three teams so they were a lot harder, but I give credit to Foothills and Ainlay. They put up a great fight but we were just more on our game."
After losing the first set by five points to Foothills the Blues roared back to win 25-21, 25-17, 27-25.
"We told ourselves to get our heads into it and pick up our defence after that first loss and that's exactly what we did," Lutz said. "Our hitters were great in the front row and that's what won it for us."
The Blues wasted no time dismantling the Titans 25-12, 25-18, 25-16 with a semifinal berth at stake.
"That was a really big one because we've never got past that second stage and for us to beat Ainley the way we did was awesome," said Follette, 17.
