Lucas Punkari
They finished the NorWOSSA regular season with identical 3-5 records.
And when the last point was scored in the NorWOSSA finals last Thursday in Dryden, the Muskie junior and senior boys’ volleyball teams saw their seasons end with identical results.
Both teams, who entered the playoffs as the second-seeded squad in their respective divisions, beat the Kenora Broncos in semi-final action to advance to the finals.
But both ultimately fell short in the championship games to the host Eagles.
For the senior spikers, their loss was a heart-breaking one as they fell to the perennial league power house in five sets (22-25, 23-25, 25-18, 25-17, and 8-15).
For head coach Alison Hyatt, however, she was extremely proud of how the team performed to finish off the season.
“That was the best [match] we had played all year long,” she enthused.
“We struggled in the first two sets against Dryden,” Hyatt noted. “But at the start of the third set, I think it set in for some of the guys, especially those who were in what could be their last high school volleyball game, that this is it.
“It was a mindset of what did you have to lose out there, and that’s exactly how they played for the rest of the [match],” she added.
Having dispatched the Broncos in straight sets (25-22, 25-17, 25-19) earlier in the day, the Muskies got off to slow starts in their opening set losses to the Eagles—something Hyatt feels occurred as a result of sitting around during the course of the day.
“Our semi-final [match] took place in the morning, so we had a lot of waiting around before our [match] took place that evening,” she noted.
“But in the two sets that we took from them, we started off strong and kept on playing that way through the rest of the [match], and we had the momentum on our side throughout those two sets.”
In the fifth and deciding set, however, the Eagles jumped out to a quick run early on and never looked back as they captured the gold and a trip to the NWOSSAA final.
“There was a really long rally early on in that set, which ended on a call that the guys got a little flustered on, and that led to Dryden’s run a little bit,” Hyatt recalled.
“But we can’t complain about the reffing because it was amazing all day,” she stressed.
“That’s the thing with those fifth sets when you only have 15 points that you need to win as it doesn’t take much for a team to jump like that,” she added.
“We were still playing strong, though, at the end of the [match]. And if it had been a [set] where we had gone up to 25 points, who knows what would have happened?”
Meanwhile, the junior boys entered the final against Dryden following a five-set semi-final thriller (25-21, 19-25, 23-25, 25-17, and 15-10) over Kenora earlier Thursday.
Unfortunately for the Muskies, they were swept off the court by the Eagles (6-25, 21-25, and 20-25) in the final, ending their bid to repeat as NorWOSSA champs.
“The day, as a whole, was awesome, especially in playing in front of the packed gym like we did,” Muskie coach John Gibson said.
“Against Kenora, I was hoping to play a little bit stronger against them and I wasn’t expecting to be in a five-set [match] with them,” he admitted.
“But when we got down, the boys came right back and were able to get the win, which was huge for them.
“[Then] in our first set against Dryden in the finals, they were able to get 15 points in three full rotations, which is just huge and that was a really big deficit to try and come back from,” Gibson noted.
“However, the last two sets were both promising from the guys as they had a nice start and a good finish in both.”
Looking ahead, both coaches are excited about their squads for next season, with Gibson’s team from this year having an almost even split of Grade 9s and 10s.
“We have six Grade 9 players that we can bring back, and two of our Grade 10 players from this year will be of junior age again next year, so it’s possible that they can be back, as well,” he said.
As for Hyatt, while she’s sad to see the players who have been a part of her first two years as the senior boys’ volleyball head coach move on, she is looking forward to a reunion of the 2010 NorWOSSA boys’ junior championship squad come next fall.
“It’ll be nice to see the guys from that team play again, especially now that they are in the senior ranks,” she remarked.
“Overall, though, if you look at this season, I think we are making a lot of strides here as a program as we were able to beat Dryden in a tournament and we played closer with them than ever before.
“We haven’t had that much success in the senior boys’ program in a while, and I think that’s something the guys leaving can be very proud of,” Hyatt stressed.
“And gives the guys that will be here next year something to strive for.”
