Thursday’s dress rehearsal for the playoffs at the 4A provincial women’s volleyball tournament left the Paul Kane Blues seeing stars.
The fourth-seeded Blues failed to win a set against the Scona Lords, Centennial Coyotes and Western Canada Redmen in the top round-robin pool to determine the final positions for the round of 16.
“We were playing almost scared,” said Whitney Follette, captain of the Metro Edmonton Premier Conference champions. “We need to go hard and not just step back and let them get at us. We need to control the game instead of them.”
In Friday’s opening playoff match the Blues played the 13th-seeded Foothills Falcons at Jasper Place High School but the score was unavailable at press time.
A victory would send the Blues into the quarter-finals and a loss would drop them into the consolation bracket.
Today’s medal finals are 5 p.m. for bronze and 7 p.m. for gold at Strathcona Composite High School.
Visit www.asaa.ca for the provincial schedule and results.
Last year at provincials the Blues finished eighth with two wins and five losses after placing seventh at 4-3 in 2009.
Follette, 17, expected the Blues to rebound after Thursday’s shaky effort.
“We just need to come out harder and believe in ourselves and play with more pride. If we play these teams with more confidence we can win out there,” said the standout Grade 12 middle.
In the best-of-three round robin matches the Blues lost 25-17, 25-17 to Scona, the top seed at provincials, 25-10, 25-19 to the second-seeded Coyotes and 25-23, 25-20 to the third-seeded Redmen.
“We didn’t come out as hard as we should have,” Follette said. “We know they’re all big hitters, but we’re taking a step back instead of being aggressive and being confident in our digging and everything else we do.”
The third-year starter had mixed emotions over the round-robin results.
“It does matter but it’s not a big deal because we’re still in the top pool. We’ll have a pretty easy crossover game [on Friday] but we’re on Scona’s side of the draw so we’ll have to play them in the semis [today at 11 a.m. at Scona] if we make it there,” she said. “I guess the best thing was our defence improved throughout the day, which is important for us.”
The Blues are 0-5 against Scona, with 11 losses in 12 sets. Last week the Edmonton public league champions swept the Blues 25-15, 25-20, 25-17 at Scona to determine the first and second ranked Edmonton zone teams at provincials.
In Thursday’s rematch Scona dominated the net with a variety of hitting schemes. Several error-filled plays by the nervous-looking Blues allowed Scona to rack up the points.
The longest point run by the Blues was three in a row in both sets. A number of long rallies also didn’t go their way.
“They had a good game. They were playing in front of their home crowd and they came out hard,” Follette said. “I can’t say we played bad. We didn’t, but our digging was pretty bad.”
The Blues hit rock bottom in the first set against the Coyotes. A run of eight points by the Calgary team, triggered by the overpowering serving of captain Alexa Gray, gave the Coyotes a commanding 15-5 lead.
In the second set the Blues rebounded after giving up six consecutive points while falling behind 13-6. A seven-point run, highlighted by Nicole Mirecki’s serving and a big kill by Follette, pulled the Blues to within one of the Coyotes at 18-17. The Coyotes replied with points off a spike and a tricky serve to regain control of the set they would not relinquish.
“We never played them before so we didn’t know what to expect,” Follette said. “It was just not a good game.”
The Blues showed flashes of their winning form against the Redmen. After the Blues scored three straight to lead 11-10, the Redmen rattled off six in a row behind Isidora Purkovic’s tough serving. It was 21-14 when the Blues clawed back to make it a one-point deficit twice before the Redmen clinched the set with their 25th point.
“The first set we came out really hard and played with pride,” Follette said.
The Blues deserved a better fate in the second set but struggled, stringing together long point runs. Quality serves by Maddi Agius and consistent hitting by Follette and Jill Tymko kept the Blues within striking distance before fading down the stretch.
The loss marked the first match against the Redmen since the Calgary team beat the Blues at the Harry Ainlay tournament.
It was also the fourth consecutive match the Blues didn’t win a set after sweeping the Bev Facey Falcons in the best-of-five premier final to repeat as metro champions.
The round robin results left the Blues with an overall 13-5 record, with 41 sets won and 16 sets lost in league play, playoffs, zones and provincials.
