Post by Go Iowa on Dec 14, 2004 12:54:22 GMT -5
bangdown said:
I was witness to this match and it was good but not great. You had two evenly matched teams going head to head and the better team won. I thought the ball controll was seriously lacking on both sides of the court. Blocking was pretty solid for both squads and serving was a little better than average. Sports Performance lost to Club Cactus later in the day in playoffs. SCVC, Riptides and LBC are going to get much better as the year progresses. I have a hard time believing that Sports Perf. is going to improve especially if McKee plays on the left side. I'm going to mention a match that I thought was better and that was SCVC vs. Balboa Bay 17's in the quaterfinals. SCVC was all over Balboa's very good outside (I think he got blocked on his first five swings) but Balboa covered him and they hung in there as SCVC pounded away. I understand that one of Balboa's starting outsides did not even play the whole tourney because of injury. Anyway, it seemed that Balboa had a game plan and it was to serve tough. They made it difficult for the setter. SCVC won the first game something like 27-29. In game two, Balboa came out very solid and just made some incredible plays defensively. SCVC came out ready to finish as their lefty smashed the ball down the line a couple times. Hits like that can demoralize teams, especially young ones. Balboa seemed to enjoy playing as all the players and coaches were having a good time, very relaxed and seemingly very confident. Balboa won a tight second game behind solid backcourt play and a very good outside hitter who also seemed to block extremly well. Going to the 3rd game you would think that Balboa was outmatched at 5 positions but they continued to dig balls and finish each point. Great rallies as Balboa built a nice lead early only to watch SCVC climb back in it before the side change. A few huge blocks and an ace propelled Balboa to 14-11 as SCVC sided out for 14-12. Balboa finished on the ensuing play. Two very good teams and lots of maturity on the part of Balboa to hang with the more experienced SCVC 18's team. Balboa's setter ran a solid offense. He is probably only 6'2 or 6'3 but he is very talented. I didn't get a chance to stick around but I've since learned that Balboa 17's went on to win the tourney again beating SMBC 18's and LBC 18's. Sports Performance's 2nd team played pretty well but looking at the scores seemed inconsistent. And ST. Louis HP had a good showing as well. It's great to have teams from the midwest come out here. Good tourney and great job to the Balboa 17's squad.
I agree. We had our boys out there and we were in that pool with SCVC and SPRI. I thought they both played better on Friday, although, SPRI came out with more emotional intensity on Saturday. SCVC is so fluid in their blocking.
I was surprised to see St. Louis do so well. They weren't that impressive a couple of weeks ago, but they had a really nice weekend.
Also, I wanted to drop kudos to everyone at the tournament. It was so well organized and the coaches there were awesome. It was our first tournament there, and it will definitely become an annual event for us!