Power League - February
SILVER DIVISION
February 10, 2007 @ Mt Hood CC - Gresham, OR

I was a little worried about going into our second Power League. For those of you not familiar with the way Power League works, it basically places you with comparable teams. Your team moves up or down in divisions. Gold is the top division followed by Silver, Bronze, etc. The theory is at end of the season, all your matches should be competitive at our Regional event. In our January Qualifier, we came out ready to play and took a surprising Silver Division placement. We aren't a Silver level team yet. We were in a very forgiving pool in our Qualifier.

Our lack of floor leadership hurts us in tight games. The girls are all so nice, nobody has stepped up in a leadership roll, yet. We are young and we are making improvements every time we play. We just aren't able to put it all together for a strong match sometimes. I have different girls step up and play well individually, but we don't get 6 kids on the floor working as a team on a regular basis.

Measuring a team on wins alone isn't a good measure of a developmental team. Cowlitz strives to move their players "up", making them better volleyball players. Running a 6-2 offense and transitioning is a lot to remember at any age level, and our Blue girls do a good job of it. We really need to work hard on serve receive and take our practice time seriously. We also need to work on not rushing our serves, and just on making them! We have players who one weekend will serve lights out awesome, then next weekend maybe hit 50%. It is the land of the 12's.

We fell into Bronze, and I think we should be able to hold our Bronze placement. We will be with teams that are still inconsistent and learning. We are a good solid team, we just need some confidence.

Top servers for the day were Maddy "Car Wash" Buckhalter, Julia Leggett (serves for our only win of the day, a come from behind victory), Erika Halverson, and Signe' Burchim.

Net players of the day were Sarah Luedke, Ryliegh Dobbins, (the 9 year old powerhouses) and Alexia Totten, tough as ever in the middle.

Hustling their hind-ends off in the back row were Renee' "Sunshine" Pitts & Kiri Greibel.

Last but not least were our setters, who really had a hard time because our passing wasn't pretty -- Jaycie Randall, Maddy, and Erika.

We really missed the consistent passing of Jamie Skeie, who had a school commitment.

Thank you again to our wonderful parents. It is hard to sit through a full day of matches, even harder when your team is struggling. Thank you!!!!

Subway Classic
February 4, 2007 @ Monticello Middle School - Longview, WA

We made great improvements in many areas. Our serves were strong and the girls did a great job all day. Our serving was lead by Jaycie Randall and Ryleigh Dobbins, followed closely by Erika Halverson. We opened the day against North Clackamas, a Gold level team that really hits the ball well. It was a respectable loss to an older, experienced team, 17- 25, 18-25. The girls did a good job of moving their feet and our serve receive is coming along.

On to match 2 vs. Webfoot Gold, a Silver division team that has some super-strong servers. Serving consistent jump serves is a good way to win games. We didn't pass well in this game; I think the girls were in awe of the serving that was being drilled at them. Jamie Skeie and Renee Pitts did a nice job in the back row. Alexia Totten stepped up and had a great day in all of the matches. She played a strong middle and was a tough competitor all day. We lost, but again respectable, 15-25 & similar second game score.

Things were good throughout the morning. Sarah Luedke did a good job in the middle, working on footwork and the constant movement on the net; we will be working on being more aggressive. Jaycie and Maddy Buckhalter did a great job setting all day! They work very hard and it pays off big when it all comes together. We had a lot of pass, set, hits during the day. Much better than our first Longview tournament. Erika Halverson did wonderful all day long. Erika gets her time in on the court in various positions. Erika sets, hits and blocks well; she was a positive teammate all day. Signe' Burchim is feeling more comfortable on the floor and her serves are great. Kiri Greibel does a great job in the back row; she is our main defensive specialist. Kiri made her first serve of the year over and scored a point! Julia Leggett was recovering from a nasty bug and did well in the front row and as always was very supportive of her teammates. Ryliegh had some great saves and is making improvements every time she plays.

We struggled with serve receive and lost all but 1 match so we finished 5th in our pool of 6, which is where we were seeded. I expected us to be either 4th or 5th going into the day of play. It was a huge disappointment during our match against Lakeside Blue. We were up 24-23, and Ryleigh served a rocket over the net. I am pretty positive it hit the floor first, BUT, no, the up ref ruled it bounced off the girl's shoe. So in the great land of which volleyball rules to follow. Sideout Lakeside, tie 24-24, we go on to lose, 24-26 and all because somebody kicked the ball back over the net. It was sort of just how the day went.

Our friends from the south, Eugene Webfoot had a huge issue with having to referee last and absolutely were not nice about it. So Cowlitz officiated the last game. Everybody was all good until about 3:00 when the Superbowl began, then our gym went to the birds. We were done with play at 5:15, but it made for a very long day. Looking forward to our next Power League where we get to see Webfoot again.

Power League Qualifier
January 20, 2007 @ The Courts at Beaverton - Beaverton, OR

Our first Power League went very well. We started the day against an Oregon City team that was much taller than us, and we aren't short. Maddy Buckhalter and Jaycie Randall did a majority of the setting and really are starting to feel more in control of the court. Jaycie started us off with some great serving and the serves just kept on coming through the pool play matches. Sarah Luedke served well and did a great job transitioning on and off the net in the middle. Ryleigh Dobbins did a great job on serve receive in this game, and hit some nice serves at key times. Kiri Griebel had the duties of libero most of the day and hustled her hind end off. Kiri had some very nice passes to setter and we had several pass, set, hits throughout the day. We took our first match in two, 25-20, 25-20. It was a nice way to start the day. We were a third seed so we had a long haul in the morning. We came out against MAC and could not seem to get a good pass. The MAC team has several under-hand servers and they just had their way with our back-row, no matter who was back there. Erika Halverson was a bright spot in this game, she stepped up and had some nice digs and really gave it 100%. We fell to MAC 15-25, 7-25.

We were having success in many areas, we had not been out of rotation once yet! In our match against PVC Orange we came out on fire! Strong serving from Alexia Totten and Signe Burchim put this one in the books for Blue! Jamie Skeie did a great job keeping the ball off the floor and really made some great saves. Julia Leggett played strong all day and had some nice kills in this game. Renee Pitts has worked very hard on her serve and learning the rotation, it really showed this tournament! Good job Renee! Blue really battled in this match and pulled it out 25-23, 25-11.

We ended up in second in our pool and had to play Rose City Mizuno (The # 1 team). We came out and played the best volleyball I had seem our team play, for 5 points. We passed awesome, we had good solid sets, and Julia had 3 really strong hits. It was a good start to a very short game after that. We couldn't keep up with the killer serves and fire power that Mizuno brought to the game. Jaycie put on the libero shirt, Erika set with Maddy and they did well. Sarah, Alexia, and Signe all got good experience at the net in this game, we need blockers when teams hit like this team did. We fell 7-25, 6-25.

We then went to our last match of the day and played Bridgetown Navy, but we were done by this point. I have a young 12 and under team: two nine year olds, mostly 10 year olds and two 11 year olds . We were just too tired to push it for 1 more match. We missed serves and struggled to pass, but it was never for lack of effort, we just ran out of gas. We lost 13-25,11-25

We ended up moving up to 13th in Silver, very good for our lack of practice (darn snow), lack of experience, and having a sick coach for the day. I am very proud of all of you! Job well done ladies. On another very bright note, we finished over an hour ahead of schedule at a PL Qualifier, that was nice.

Pre-Qualifier Tournament
January 7, 2007 @ Longview, WA

On a rainy Sunday in Longview, our "Blue Beginners" all showed up at the right gym. All 11 players had on the right uniform, and we looked really good. We are a team with all the right parts, and have been practicing that way from day 1. We will get it all together, and everybody will be amazed! We run a 6-2 with everybody switching to their correct base. This was a challenge but we started to really move as the day went on.

We started the day against Power Surge. I am pretty sure they could have played last weekend in the 16's tournament ... they are good. They are a tough team with great servers! We battled and did okay with the rotation. Jaycie Randall and Maddy Buckhalter did a good job setting and serving all day. The nerves got to them a little in the first match of the day, but by game 3 they were feeling more in charge of the floor. Kiri Greibel started the day as my libero; she gets to the ball fast and gets it up. We are working on always trying to get 3 touches, not just playing bump ball. Ryleigh Dobbins played left back and outside and did great. By the end of the day she felt more confident in moving to her base and started hitting well. We fell to Power Surge 25-9, 25-15. I was thrilled we pulled 15 points out of game 2.

Next up was our match against West Valley. We started strong against this team; we took an early lead and played better than match 1. We struggled with rotation and it helped West Valley get momentum. The up ref was quick on the whistle and we weren't ready so we gave up 3 or 4 points to rotation errors. Julia Leggett (oh/lb) was solid in her first 2 games; she served well and started to get the hang of moving into her base. A prior commitment took Julia away for match 3 and 4; she was missed. Kiri had some very nice passes in this game; her back row is getting stronger and her confidence in her setters is coming along. Erika Halverson shared setting duties with Jaycie, and Maddy moved to outside. They did well, but it was too much information to remember. I realized moving 12 year olds into different positions might not be the best choice. A coaching error on my part ... keep it simple in 12's. We lost 19-25, 17-25.

Our next match was against Brigetown White. I felt like we matched up well with them. I think we had some moments in this game where the girls really started to play volleyball a few times. We had some good rallies and we moved to our bases better. Our servers did a better job in match 3 led by Maddy, Jaycie, and Erika Halverson (oh/s/mb). Bridgetown sends the ball back over right away and we really tried to set it up every chance we had. Sarah Luedke (mb) had a wonderful block in this match, perfect! Getting her to move quicker to base will lead to more blocks; her first one was very nice. She did a good job transitioning to her middle blocker position and playing the net. Renee Pitts (lb/oh) started to get the transition to defense a lot better in this match and had some great passes! Jamie Skeie was outstanding in this match; she stepped up and really did a great job playing oh/lb all the way around. Jamie served well and really helped keep our rotation moving along. Jamie is smart and picks things up fast ... she did awesome. We fell again, 12-25, and 18-25.

That put us in 4th place in pool C . We faced Cowlitz Gold in our afternoon elimination game. Cowlitz Gold is also learning a 6-2 and was facing the same serving issues that plagued us all morning. I was happy to see our Blue team have a little spark that was not there in the morning matches. Alexia Totten (mb) is one of my stronger players and a team leader; she finally woke up and played great! Alexia had her bullet serve and the transition was coming along. We had several bump, set, hits, that actually went over the nets. Signe' Burchim, my 5' 7" (rf), played well and served great in this game. Erika had to move to middle because we were down to only 1, and she really did well. Jaycie, Renee', and Maddy made some great reads on short balls and picked them up like a vacuum. Gold gave us a great game that could have went either way; we picked up the first 25-23. It gave our little Blue team the shot in the arm they needed. We played our best volleyball of the day in game 2 and our serves we more consistent. We picked up game 2 at 25-13.

We moved over to Monticello and faced Bridgetown Navy. We came out a little flat and had trouble with serve receive. We were happy and it seemed like they were understanding transition more. I am very proud of all the girls; we had a rough morning and we battled back and made progress. I didn't write down the score, but Bridgetown won by about 7 in game 1 and 8 or 9 in game 2.