Meet the Team

Let the craziness begin!  The girls are both participating in high school volleyball this year.  Practices started the end of July and will continue keeping us hopping through mid-October.  It is fun knowing they are practicing together and experiencing life together.  Not all siblings get that chance.  This is just a few pictures from Meet the Team this year.

*On an unrelated note, school starts in two days from when I am posting this.  That changes the rhythm of life here – and I could hardly keep up with it during the summer!  I am going to try to build it in so it doesn’t get overwhelming, but just know we are just living life even if I haven’t posted!

Madison - Track

Madison committed to track again this year and enjoyed it.  She stuck with the distance trend – running the mile most of the season.  She started with a time of 7:03 minutes and ended with a time of 6:34min!  A great improvement over the course of the season, but even improved from last year’s PR of 6:48.  It is also the time she puts in running with a great group of girls that makes it worth it.  She builds friendships, confidence, and speed in the daily grind. 

She tried out the 400m dash twice this year.  The 400m is a grueling sprint all the way around the track.  Both times she ran a 1:12 min 400m.  She said after running the first time that she now knew what it was like to feel like she couldn’t give any more.  I think this helped with her mile time because she knew how to push and what it really felt like. 

She also ran the 4x800m relay once or twice, which is the event she helped fill gaps for last year. 

   

In the awards banquet, the track coach, Mrs. Greer, noted that for county and district meets it was good to have Madison (and Maggie) as her right hand recording times and keeping details.  She also said that she enjoyed Madison on the team because she was always willing to fill a spot where needed and try new things.  Such encouragement!

Ellie, Madison, and I headed to the state track meet to cheer on her fellow 4x800m runners (Ellie, Leah, Ellis, and Izzy), as well as the boys in the relays that made it from Dalton.  The meet is at Jesse Owens Stadium on the Ohio State campus.  It is a pretty cool (but sweltering hot) venue.  We slathered on the sunscreen and settled in for some good track. 

Before the girls 4x800m relay, they spontaneously formed a prayer circle which was pretty cool to see. 

The girls 4x800m team did not make the podium (top 8), but to make it to state is quite the accomplishment! 

The boys’ 4x200m relay placed 6th and the boys’ 4x100 placed 8th! I am learning to love track – and it shows since I drove to Columbus for the state meet!  I am glad my kids went out for a sport that was unfamiliar to me.

We decided to stay overnight and enjoy Columbus the next day as well.  Graeter’s ice cream on Friday night, shopping and Jenni’s ice cream on Saturday.  I think Jenni’s won the battle due to their unique flavors, but both are worth enjoying!

 

Ellie’s 8th Grade Volleyball Season

Ellie had 15 girls on her volleyball team – a crowded roster for sure!  Coach had started the season expecting to have an “A” team and a “B” team.  As practice continued, she decided that the skill levels of the girls were not distinctive enough to create the disparity of teams.  So, she played two similarly skilled teams of kids.  Sometimes the first set would win, sometimes the second set.  They group supported and encouraged one another.  And they all showed growth.  It was a lot of fun watching, with some nail-biters thrown in for good measure!

    

Ellie played middle hitter for a majority of the season.  She worked on blocking, getting her hands on quite a few balls.  She also worked on becoming more aggressive with her hits.  While she had few opportunities to serve in a game, she did show more consistency in her serve. 

              

She had fun – jumped around, cheered, got nervous, high-fived, and prepared for each game. 

Youth night at Dalton:

Volley for the Cure game:

Then, came the tournament.  We were seeded #1, with a loss to Hillsdale and a loss to Northwestern.  First up, we played Rittman.  While we felt pretty confident we would win, you just never know.  (We did win.) Then, we watched Norwayne fall to Waynedale – an upset by all accounts, but Waynedale had shown some huge improvement during the season.  We had to play them in the next round.  Our advantage?  They only had 7 on their team, the Norwayne game had been long and draining, and they were tired.  We had just sat and relaxed.  We won, but it was a fight. Finally, we waited to see who the final would be against – the other games had been played in the middle school gym at Smithville and we wondered who would come over.  Northwestern – a rematch from last season when we lost. 

At some point, Ellie missed her chance to sub in for Ava Doty.  So, Ava played middle for a point.  It gave us all a reason to laugh a minute.

We went 3 sets, always playing from behind and somehow scraping up points to win.   The win was well earned and very exciting!!

      

Regardless of how the season would have ended, we were so proud of you, Ellie.  You played with your heart on your sleeve.  You encouraged others and you felt the win or lose the same whether you were on or off the court for final point.  We hope you continue to love playing and can continue to improve along the way.  Love you!

Madison’s Sophomore Volleyball Season

Every year is different.  Being on JV is not the same as being on the freshmen team.  But I believe it could be. 

I write this, and I don’t know how to write this.  It was a hard season.  Probably a harder season for us as parents than it was for Madison.  Mostly, because she is a better person than us.  I want this to be a true testament to the season for my future self to remember.  But I also want it to reflect positively on Madison.  So, maybe there will be two different perspectives.  I’ll start with the hard and end with the good.

This summer, there were opportunities for the volleyball girls – open gyms, lifting sessions, summer league, and additional agility sessions.  She loved agility training, enjoyed open gyms, and saw growth in what she could do at lifting.  Summer league was another story.  She went to this and all things any time she was available and poured her heart into it.  The new JV coach, however, saw summer not as a chance to let the girls flourish, make mistakes, grow, develop, and bond, but as a time to win, find her favorites, and make her team.  It is not what it is supposed to be – it is not required; it is not the season.  So, Madison, along with 4 others, found that they sat out at summer league games.  Then, they continued to sit – even at 2 different scrimmages – scrimmages that were each 3 hours long against various other schools – never once getting a chance to get in the game … at a scrimmage.  Our minds were blown.  Never have we been a part of programs where scrimmages were seen as a do or die situation.  The season continued in the same manner.  If the coach put in benchwarmers, it was in the last few points of the game and only one at a time, so they alternated random nights of play.  It was the saddest thing I have ever been a part of. 

    

It maybe would have made a tiny bit of sense if the players on the court were all-stars who didn’t make many mistakes, who looked like a well-oiled machine, and who looked like they were having fun.  But none of those things were true.  The girls playing were pretty much at the same skill level as those sitting the bench.  Those playing made a TON of mistakes with no fear that they would ever come out – while those that hardly got in played thinking if they shanked the ball once meant they wouldn’t get in again.  Those playing did not communicate or move cohesively as a team and they didn’t look like they were having fun most of the time.  Not trying to tear them down, I am just saying there were some that could have been given a chance.  Did they win?  Yes.  So, if that is the goal, great.  But I think the goal of a JV team is to grow players for a varsity level team.  That means you have no idea who is going to improve and who is at their peak. That you give kids playing time – not equal, but earned and deserved opportunities – to develop.  That is what coaching is about, right?  Taking each player and helping them grow – and rewarding them in the best possible way… as a part of a team on and off the court.

While Jeremy and I sat on the bleachers stewing and mumbling in disbelief as the gap in the score widen and no one got in, Madison and her crew stood up and cheered, high-fived the two subs that went in, and pressed on.  There were only two games during the season where Madison showed disappointment/frustration with how things were going.  And those were the two most difficult times. 

On a positive note, Madison worked hard.  She showed resilience in an obviously difficult situation.  It was hard to see if she was making progress/getting better with the lack of court time.  However, she would come back and tell us about her serves steadily improving – going farther and more consistently over the net.  I could see her movement on the court was good, adjusting to block coverage and hitting coverage.  When she was on the court, she picked up some nice digs, had some good passes to the setter, and played well overall. 

    

While this season was not as we expected, we were so proud of our daughter.  She never quit, never had a bad attitude, always encouraged, and worked hard.  We hope she walked away from the season believing the best of herself and still enjoying volleyball.  We love you to the moon and back!

Madison Continues with Track

Madison had a hard November when she tried out for the 323 volleyball league and didn’t make it.  They said they would like to see her strengthen her serving and passing skills.  It was incredibly disappointing.  Her plan was to do this in the spring to improve her volleyball for the fall.  It would be her spring sport.  However, it didn’t work out as we had hoped.

But it was a blessing in disguise.  Because she didn’t participate in that, she decided she would try track at the high school level.  She was unsure which events to do.  She had done hurdles and high jump in middle school.  So, she started there.  She did some work outs with the sprinters and didn’t love it.  She did work outs with the distance people and found her groove.  She still did some hurdle work, but her focus became the mile, a hole that needed filled on the roster, and whatever else was needed.  She did 100m hurdles, 300m hurdles, ran on the 4x400m relay, and ran on the 4x800m relay, and ran the 800m dash/run.  She had a lot of fun this season getting to know the girls on the team, working to PR (personal record), and just running… she says running is fun (must get that from Jeremy!). 

It was fun to watch her mile time tick down by seconds as the season progressed.  Her first meet she ran a 7:12, then a 7:03, then her goal was to be sub 7 minute mile.  She hit that mark at the next meet with a 6:59:49!  The next week, she knocked 10 seconds off that time for a 6:49:92!  At WCAL meet, she ran a 6:48:6.  And at districts, she placed 13th with a time of 6:48:33.  Every meet she pushed harder and came up a little quicker.  And let me tell you, the weather was not in her favor!  We sat through rain, snow, wind, cold almost every meet.  If it was a track day, you could almost guarantee it was raining.

                  

She also was a part of the 4x800m relay team.  The first time mid-season.  They ran a 10:53 collectively that race.  Then, because her friend, Jaida, was struggling physically with her knees by the end of the season, Madison filled in for her at districts.  My mom joined me to cheer Madison on at Districts which were an hour away (Jeremy was traveling and Ellie had a middle school dance).  And it was raining for the beginning of the meet, but let up by the time her relay came around.  They blew their previous time out of the water with a time of 10:34 (Madison’s leg was 2:53) to place 3rd and move onto regionals. 

        

We celebrated with Cane’s afterwards.

Regionals were also about an hour away.  Jeremy was traveling (again!), but Ellie went with me to cheer her on!  And you guessed it, it rained!  Then, let up for us to watch the relays.  The team did well, but the competition was tough.  They placed 11th with a time of 10:35 (Madison’s leg was 2:54).  But with such a young team, one junior, one sophomore and two freshmen, they could be so proud of what they did!

    

Way to go, Madison!  I am learning to love track.  So proud of your hard work!