Chesapeake Girls Drop A Tight One To Southern

By Colin A.J. Murphy

In a highly competitive, back-and-forth matchup, the Chesapeake High School volleyball team suffered a close loss to the visiting Southern Bulldogs on September 8. The loss drops the Cougars to 1-2 on the season, but strong play for stretches against the Bulldogs provided the Chesapeake girls a promissory note for continued improvement as the season progresses.

“We started off slow, but in the second game got really energetic and hit our stride, all came together as a team,” said senior captain Ahren Ray, adding that while they played well for a portion of the match, there is still plenty of work to be done to become more consistent as a team. “When something goes wrong, we have to learn to pick ourselves up and get back to where we were.”

The best-of-five match got off to a promising start for the Cougars, who took a 4-1 lead in the first game. Southern did not let the Chesapeake girls build a significant lead, and the two teams battled within three points of one another for the whole game before the Bulldogs sealed a 25-21 win.

Dropping the first game seemed to light a fire under the Chesapeake girls, who emerged from the break with a burst of aggressive play. In the second game, the Cougars went up 12-4 on the strength of several spectacular kills by juniors Taylor McMillan, Sierra Kraushaar, and Caitlin Sterling. Several points were saved by outstanding digs by junior Katie Alder and senior co-captain Sam Hepner, allowing the Cougars to extend their lead to 18-11. One point saw over 10 hits from each side before a difficult dig by junior Erika Carter led to a powerful hit for the point by Kraushaar, pushing the Cougars out to a 20-12 lead. Southern pushed for a would-be tremendous comeback, but a kill by Carter ultimately closed out a 25-18 win for Chesapeake.

The Cougars’ momentum carried them to a convincing 25-11 win in the third game, which featured multiple aces by Kraushaar, impressive digs by Carter and Hepner, and several fearsome kills by Sterling and Ray. Having not trailed since the final point of Game 1, it appeared as though the Cougars had overcome the early-match jitters and put themselves firmly on the path to match victory.

But Southern was by no means willing to go down easily, and to their credit they played inspired come-from-behind volleyball in the fourth and fifth games. In Game 4, Chesapeake held a 15-12 lead before Southern exploded for a 13-4 scoring rally to win 25-19 and push the match to a fifth and final game. The Bulldogs had swung the momentum fully back in their favor, and they never trailed again, winning the fifth game 15-8 to seal the 3-2 match victory.

Despite the loss, senior co-captain Dianna Marroquin see a lot of positives for the team moving forward. “I think the outlook for us is good,” she said. “We are aiming for us as a team to get better and for the newcomers to get better.”

Head Coach Mike Gimon acknowledged his team needs to continue to refine their focus and not be content with good but inconsistent play. But he also knows they have the ability and competitive fire to be a very competitive team this season. “We showed we can be scrappy and play hard,” he said. “If we keep this up, I think we’re going to be very successful.”