Halfway There

Hey everyone, I know it's been like two weeks since my last entry so we have some catching up to do so let's get to it. We knew that if we won our last two matches going into the winter break we would definitely have a spot in the Grand Prix the first weekend of January, but of course we had to make it interesting.

Our match against Falkoping on the 12th was another disappointing one that eventually ended in our first home loss of the season. The match went to four sets, but for whatever reason we were never really comfortable playing that day. Our passing was pretty poor all day and offensively we couldn't seem to do anything right. We knew that we would still have an outside chance of jumping into the top four and getting the Grand Prix bid, but we had to beat a decent Habo team on the road, where we've won just once all year.

We made some changes in the lineup, including moving me to middle blocker and Eric Simon to opposite, and had a pretty good week of practice leading up to our trip down to Habo (another 7 AM van trip) and hoped to get off to the good start that we desperately needed. That didn't happen. We dropped the first two sets in a couple close ones. Going into the ten minute halftime break we thought that we had already been eliminated from the top four. We had a good team talk and went out with a whole new attitude in the third set. We knew we had nothing to lose.

The match completely changed after that break and we stormed back for a five set win, including dominating set five, where we led 10-1 at one point. The last three sets were probably the best we played all year, we were getting a lot of good touches blocking, which means it's a lot easier to play defense behind it. And offensively, we drastically cut down on the errors that normally kill us.

We got to the locker room and some of the guys immediately turned to their iPhones to check the other scores from around the league. We realized that Hylte was our main competition for the last spot and they needed to get all three points on the day (a three or four set win) against Linkoping. We watched the points add up for Linkoping through the first three sets and were extremely relieved when they took a two sets to one lead, which meant that Hylte could only get two standings points and that put us in the Grand Prix!

This was a huge relief for us as missing the Grand Prix would definitely mean we were underachieving greatly in the first half of the season. Going into the two-week Christmas break we are feeling pretty good about our prospects for a strong second half with a new lineup and hopefully a signature win to gain some momentum. We got most of our difficult road matches out of the way in the first half so as long as we can protect our barn down the stretch we should end up with a good playoff seed.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, I'll have some more Grand Prix info when I get back to Sweden at the end of this week!

Round Seven: Road Warriors

The one thing we knew going into the last three matches before the holiday break was that our fate is in our own hands. If we found a way to win these last three matches we would be in the Swedish Grand Prix, the beginning of January tournament of the top four teams in the country. However, we would have to get two of those three wins on the road, something that had alluded us so far this season.

The first match was today at Vingåker, a team that came into the match at 0-6 in the league. After playing the match I was personally surprised that this team hasn't won this season. They have to very solid middles and a good setter to go along with a less than average pin offense. We knew going into the match that if we controlled their middles we would win.

Game one was our typical slow start. We let a couple balls drop that should have been picked up and defensively it seemed like we were a step slow. Thankfully we figured it out and after a tough battle through the teens we took a 21-18 lead. Of course we made it a little interesting before pulling it out 25-23. It was only our second game win of the season on the road and we had to make sure that we carried that momentum into game two. We did.

We jumped out to an 8-4 lead before I came up to serve. For the first time since I got here basically I had a great game jump serving. I went on a five point run to put us up 13-4, which included a couple aces and a couple overpasses forced. As much as I'd like to take credit for hard work, I think the ball has made the most difference. Most matches we have played this year have been with a ball that for some reason doesn't do what I want it to do when I'm serving. It's a little heavier than the one we used today (which is actually the official FIVB international ball), and I just can't seem to get the toss right, or the ball to snap in bounds with top spin. But we just got an order of the lighter ones in at our home gym and have been able to practice with them this week. It made a world of difference in our match tonight, hitting and serving. Anyways, we took a 16-8 lead into the second technical timeout and were feeling good about about the way things were going. They proceeded to cut into the lead with a series of float servers to make it 21-16 and we limped to the finish for another 25-23 win.

Game three was a game that we had to have, not only to make sure we got three points, but to make sure we get some confidence in a gym other than our own. They kept it close until the first technical timeout, we led 8-7, but we broke away from there. A huge serving run from Kyle Masterson pushed our lead to 16-8 and we kept our foot on the gas all the way to the end for a change. It seems they couldn't do anything right, which was punctuated with a missed serve by them on match point.

Hopefully this match will be a sign of things to come. We played much more like a team today than we have been playing recently and it showed in the results. It may have been thanks to a change at libero, but in any case, it was good to see us finish games better than we have been.

While the match was going on I didn't feel like it was the best match I've played this season, but stats-wise it definitely was. I finished with 12 kills and three aces for a match leading 15 points, so I'll take that any day.

Upcoming this week, it looks like me and Eric are finally going to make a trip to Stockholm on Wednesday to check it out and we have a solid team in Falkoping coming up to Tierp this Sunday for our last home match before the three-week holiday break. Hopefully we can keep things headed in the right direction. God natt!