Well, my first tournament with Northside Shockers came and went and it certainly had its ups and downs. We lost a nailbiter to McLuvin 15-13 in the third for the finals, which was disappointing but I don't plan on dwelling on it. The tournament itself was incredibly balanced - 2 teams went 5-3, one went 4-4, and the last 2 went 3-5. Talk about parity! Was fun to play in.
The ups were I couldn't be happier with my team. Great players, great attitudes, and very patient with me (we'll get to that later). We played iron man (6 guys, no libero) - and I was pretty impressed with our 6'7-6'8 middles playing backrow! We certainly had our spurts where teams made runs on us, but for our first tournament of the year there's a lot to be positive about.
As for me personally, it was a tournament of ups and downs. The first match I played outside and felt pretty comfortable - a few unforced hitting errors that had me shaking my head afterwards, but overall a decent start. Afterwards, they switched me and the opposite, and I got off to a great start by having the opponent's outside (Rob Housing I believe, pretty good player out of NIU) destroy my left thumb on a block. I played through it, but my serve receive never fully recovered from it, as I was struggling to set a standard ball even while peppering.
Aside from that, my hitting just wasn't as crisp on the rightside. Kwon is the best setter I've stepped on a court with, I just need to work on taking a sharper approach as I'm sittin on the pin, while most the sets were more like back 2's. It's been awhile since I've played in a fast-tempo system, so I'm just gettin rid of the cobwebs and working on my approach. Still, I'm getting a lot of solo blocks, I should be terminating those balls. In the finals I started to connect better, and I think I'll do fine with time. However, my blocking needs to be a little stronger, which I'm sure will come with repetition.
Despite what I felt wasn't my best first impression with the team, everyone was cool and Kwon made sure to tell me not to be so hard on myself. He's a great player/coach, and I look forward to improving under his wing! It reminds me of the first season I played USAV with Bada Bing, and although I didn't start every match, I learned a lot and used that with a good off-season to move up to a go-to hitter for them the following season. Hope I can do the same for this squad!
Went to the doctor about my thumb, he said it was a pretty good sprain. Thought there might be a slight tear to the ligament/muscle, but after I did his rehab/icing for a few days, he felt like that most likely wasn't the case. The swelling's already down quite a bit, but the pain's still pretty strong. I'm testing it out at a setter's clinic I run on Thursdays tonight, and with a little tape I should have no problem this weekend.
Looking forward to this weekend - Windy City Invitational in Vernon Hills. We have an incredibly tough pool, running into Summit and Lights Out, two of the stronger Chicagoland teams. I'm very excited to play against them, Summit is a 2-time AA USAV National Champion, with a few 5th's in the Open Division. Lights Out played in Open last year as well. This tournament we're bringing 8, including a libero (my boy Kyle Due who I've always wanted to play alongside) and a lefty opposite, which hopefully opens me up for a little more outside work. Regardless, I'll play whatever position the team needs, and am fired up to have a strong second tournament with the team!
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