Big Valley Christian capitalizes on opportunities, wins first section volleyball title
In sports, momentum is everything. If the Big Valley Christian volleyball team didn’t know that before, they certainly do now.
After starting each set slowly, the Lions scored timely points to win their first CIF Sac-Joaquin Section Championship, sweeping Forest Lake Christian 25-17, 25-18, 25-17.
“This is what we’ve worked for all season long, and feels like hard work rewarded.” said coach Sarah Beers.
In each set, the two teams played each other close, but near the middle, Big Valley Christian found its stride and built up momentum that carried it to the finish.
“Momentum is huge,” said Beers. “We play and we practice for that because we have three amazing strong first servers and that’s really their role, to get those really aggressive, hard servers in the beginning, and do our best to throw the other teams out of their systems.”
The Lions’ nerves showed early. They had trouble stopping Forest Lake’s Sadie Whaley, who finished the first set with eight kills and earned the Falcons timely points and an early 11-9 lead.
“I don’t have any film on this team,” Beers said. “So I really had no idea coming into this ... then seeing her in warmups, I was like, ‘OKI, guys, they’re gonna set that ball at her every single time.’”
“We needed to get that block closed to try to make her go around that block.”
Whaley, the Falcons’ best hitter, finished the match with 21 kills.
When things clicked for the Lions’ offense, they didn’t look back. After tying the first set at 11, they outscored the Falcons 14-7 to close out the first set and ended the second on a 10-3 run.
They pulled ahead 13-5 in the final set and maintained a comfortable lead on the way to victory.
(Volleyball) is a mental game,” said senior Alexis Roest. “Once you win those first sets, you have a much better chance of winning the third.”
Roest and Trinity Beers came up big for Big Valley Christian, getting the team points through big hits and aces when the team needed to build momentum.
Both finished the game with 10 kills. Beers finished with 21 digs while Roest finished with 11.
“It’s definitely a lot of pressure.,” said Roest on what it’s like to be a go-to player. “But of course, when you do help your team out it feels really good.”
Said Trinity Beers: “When our team relies on us, we have to be the ones to step up and I think we’ve done a pretty good job of that.”
Both teams in the section final will advance to the state playoffs.
This story was originally published November 7, 2021 at 5:00 AM.
