Park played their first and unfortunately last section game on Thursday, Oct 22. The game was played against Edina at home and went to four out of five sets. Parks’ record during the regular season being better than Edina’s may have given them better odds going into the game, but Edina came into the game with intensity, and their use of strong blocking helped them take the first set. Park found their footing in the second set, bringing the match to a score of 1-1, and the second and third sets were very evenly scored, with Edina winning both of them after prevailing in long rallies for the final necessary points for both teams.
Assistant varsity coach Wyatt Schue said the coaching staff’s message to the team going into the game was to leave it all out on the court, to enjoy playing the sport and to rely on the experience gained throughout the season.
“Any time you’re talking about a playoff game, (we tell the team) to have confidence. You had a year’s worth of preparation. We did make some adjustments before the game, but it’s not even about that. You’ve got to have confidence in yourself,” Scheu said. “You’ve got to have fun and almost bring it back to when you’re a kid, it’s a game, have fun. Enjoy every moment out there. You can’t play to avoid losing. You’ve got to play like you want to win, or play like you’re trying to make yourself proud.”
Senior captain Grace Johnson said the team didn’t have their best performance, and they could have achieved more in the game if they had played more aggressively. According to her, a lot of athletes put in exceptional effort, which was amazing to see, regardless of the result.
“We didn’t play our best overall, but we had a lot of players that normally don’t step up, step up a lot tonight, which was really good to see. We were nervous playing in this game, and played too safe, instead of playing aggressively and not going all out as much as we could,” Johnson said. “I feel like we didn’t make adjustments as fast as we could, so I feel like we’ve played better, especially against higher competition. It sucks to lose, but there were still some really great moments.”
Junior captain Celia Slattengren said the team played well overall, but they were not able to maintain high energy throughout the game. According to her, they got caught in slumps that were hard to break out of.
“There were some moments that were great, and overall, we played pretty well,” Slattengren said. “There were just a lot of moments where we would get in a rut, and we weren’t able to quickly get out of it. That really swayed the momentum of the game.”
According to Schue, Edina was a difficult and worthy opponent, and the Park team should be happy with the performance that they displayed. He said they gave effort and passion all the way until the final point.
“I want to give my props to Edina. I think it’s clear that they did their game planning. They changed how they played a little bit, and they always deserve credit for that. So I want to congratulate them on the win,” Scheu said. “I think we played well. I think a lot of the girls have something to be really proud about. I hope they don’t have any regrets, because I don’t think there are any regrets to be had. You always want to win, but we didn’t roll over; we played our hardest. They had heart all the way through to the end, and that’s something that I think they should all be able to appreciate.”
According to Johnson, the team did a lot in practice to prepare for Edina’s strengths and watched film of the team to identify their weaknesses. Johnson said the prep was mainly centered around being able to counter what Edina was best at, to have the best chance of success.
“We watched films on (the Edina girls’ volleyball team) to see what tendencies they have. They have a really big block, as we saw in the game. So we tried to hit (specific) spots instead of just swinging. Obviously, we didn’t fully go through (with) it most of the time, but we definitely prepared for trying to get different shots,” Johnson said.
Slattengren said the team had a lot of players that have not had sectional experience before. So their mentality going into the game was to brush off any bad plays and just keep pushing forward.
“We were all just trying to stay positive and not put too much pressure on ourselves, especially because it is a section game, so there is pressure on it,” Slattengren said. “We also have a very young team, and a lot of people who haven’t been through this before, so we really wanted to keep the pressure off and realize that we can do good things. Even if mistakes happen, we shake them off right away.”
