Continuously serving Kosciusko County since 1854
Volleyball coach Itanya Coon huddled around the net with four or five others long after the fans had gone home, pondering Warsaw's loss and talking it over in hushed tones. What happened, where it went wrong.
Warsaw's volleyball team has played 14 matches this season. Match No. 14, a 15-6, 12-15, 15-10 Thursday loss - at home, to Northern Lakes Conference foe Plymouth - was the toughest to take.
Warsaw dropped to 9-5 overall and 1-2 in the NLC. Plymouth improved to 13-4 overall and 2-1 in the NLC.
Any hopes Warsaw had of winning the NLC title took a severe hit. Not only does Plymouth have only one loss, another team, Concord, is undefeated in the NLC.
Asked if this was the most difficult loss of the season, Coon said, "Probably the most disappointing. We were equally skilled. It was just mental mistakes we made. That was the worst part."
The Tigers played well enough to win in the middle. What killed them were the start and the finish.
Plymouth won the first game by burying Warsaw early, taking a 12-0 lead. Plymouth led the second match 12-10, but after several sideouts and missed opportunities where the Pilgrims failed to close Warsaw out, the Tigers claimed that game.
"We came out on fire," Plymouth coach Angie Stevens said. "We didn't do anything wrong. As a coach it's great to watch that in the first game, but you're always afraid of the second game. I told the girls Warsaw would play better the second game.
"After playing so well the first game, it was easy to have a letdown. We stood around and watched balls hit the floor. We let up."
Said Coon: "We have a tough time coming out and playing from the first serve. We want to wait until it's 10-0 before we start playing. That's been our biggest problem all year."
Warsaw led game three 10-5 but watched Plymouth score 10 unanswered to win 15-10.
In game one, Plymouth dominated early at the net. The Pilgrims were the aggressors, taking it to the Tigers.
If Plymouth juniors Brittany Rash and Brandy Swihart weren't delivering kills, junior Lesley Blackburn was acing the Tigers with her serves.
Blackburn, who finished the night with nine aces, served three in a row in the first game to push Plymouth's lead from 8-0 to 11-0.
"Today I had been struggling in practice," Blackburn said. "I was just trying to get it over. Somehow they managed to go over harder than I thought they would go."
As the first game was wrapping up, the Tigers began shaking off whatever sluggishness plagued them. Rather than be on the defensive against Plymouth, Warsaw clutched the momentum and kept it.
A tip here by junior Amie Poling, a laser shot there by junior Lindsay Woods. A kill by junior Kara Kesler. By senior Laura Overton. By junior Kristen DeGeeter. For the first time, looks of indecision crept in the eyes of the Plymouth players, caught offbalance by Warsaw. Where -Êand how - would Warsaw attack next?
Warsaw rode this momentum into game three, taking a 10-5 lead. But then one of the two longest volleys of the evening occurred, and Plymouth won it on a kill by junior Traci Meredith.
Neither team knew it then, but after that volley, Plymouth would outscore Warsaw 10-0 to win 15-10.
"That has been the best thing about this team this year: We win the long points," Stevens said. "That's what got us the third game."
Coon shrugged off the importance of the volley.
"To me, it wasn't that big of a deal," she said. "That one volley doesn't make the game."
After Plymouth took the 11-10 lead, Blackburn served four straight aces to seal the win.
"When that serve gets on, it's a hard serve to stop," Stevens said. "It's a real tough top-spin, but it also curves. It looks like it's coming right at you, but at the last second, it curves and drops."
To Coon, the loss occurred not because of what Plymouth did, but because of what Warsaw didn't do.
"They (Warsaw) played tough and they played hard, but they didn't play smart," she said. "They made a lot of mental errors.
"The third game we decided it would be a different team out there. We didn't play like we did in game two. Plymouth didn't do anything special, didn't do anything different than the second game."
PLYMOUTH DEF. WARSAW 15-6, 12-15, 15-10
Warsaw stats
Aces - Amie Poling 3, Laura Overton 2
Kills -ÊLindsay Woods 12, Kristen DeGeeter 5, Kara Kesler 5
Blocks - Nerecia Taylor 14, Woods 6, Amie Poling 3, Kesler 3
Assists -ÊPoling 22, Woods 3
Digs - Overton 13, Andrea Saldivar 12, Poling 10
Records - Warsaw 9-5, 1-2 NLC; Plymouth 13-4, 2-1 NLC
JV: WARSAW DEF. PLYMOUTH 15-9, 15-5
Warsaw stats
Service points -ÊLindsay Simcoe 12 (1 ace), Amber Barrett 9 (3 aces), Hillary O'Connell 4
Kills - Jana Knisely 7, Myra Sells 4, Erin Cook 3
Blocks -ÊSells 17, O'Connell 5, Leah Kiphart 4
Assists - Kiphart 11, Simcoe 3
Digs - Barrett 11, O'Connell 10, Sells 4, Simcoe 4
Warsaw JV record - 11-1, 3-0 NLC
