Volleyball reaches final eight in state tournament

November 5, 2008 • Jesse Crowell  
Filed under Sports

 

 

The Storm continued their outstanding second-half season play with a victory over Silverton in the second round of the 5A state playoffs. 

After dropping the first game, the Storm,  who entered the playoffs as the No. 4 seed from the Intermountain Conference, rallied a comeback and defeated the Foxes 14-25, 25-14, 26-24, 25-23.

 Silverton was the No. 1 seed from the Mid- Willamette Conference. 

Junior Kelsey Zimmerman played a big game for the Storm, contributing 19 kills, while Therese Bennett, another junior, was a perfect 24 for 24 from the serving line. 

Andreana Antone also had 31 assists during the match. 

To complete the comeback, the squad played one of their best defensive games of the year. Becky Defoe was the leader on defense, recording 22 digs on the night. 

“It was a yo-yo match,” said head coach Jill Waskom when asked about her team’s second round victory.

The Storm defeated Sherwood on the road in the first round of the 5A state playoffs (25-17, 22-25, 26-24, 20-25, 15-12), and with the two playoff wins, they now will compete in the eight-team 5A state championship tournament taking place in Hillsboro.

In the Sherwood match, junior Kelsey Zimmerman posted a career-best game, contributing 27 kills and six aces.

The tournament is held at Lincoln High School and begins Friday, Nov. 7. 

With the two wins in the postseason, the Storm have continued their outstanding play in the second half of the season.

After the opening five games of the season, the Storm had posted a 1-4 record and put themselves in a difficult position to contend for the playoffs. 

However, the young team turned the season around with a 3-0 shutout of Bend (25-20, 26-24, 25-14) on Oct. 7. 

Following the defeat of Bend, the second-half of the season proved to be much stronger for the squad. 

The young team, led by their lone senior Kendall Schultz, put together a five-game winning streak which helped them achieve  7-7-0 IMC record (13-11-1 overall record) and fourth place in the conference standings.  

The second-half-of-the-season-comeback became complete on Oct. 24 as the Storm clinched a postseason position by defeating Hermiston 25-22, 25-14, 25-16. 

 One of the biggest wins during the winning streak came on Oct. 21 when the Storm defeated The Dalles-Wahtonka (25-16, 25-16, 25-12) on “Senior Night”.  

Schultz, who after the loss of Bethany Chriss to injury earlier in the season, was the only senior on the roster, stepped up in the match against The Dalles-Wahtonka.

She contributed seven kills, which led the team, and kept them barely alive for playoff contention.