‘A fire inside’: Ripon Christian volleyball team looks for perfectly strong league finish
Behind the high flying, hard hitting and loud cheering of volleyball, the game is actually very simple.
Ripon Christian High coach Kayla Kootstra constantly reminds her team the game comes down to two things.
“Volleyball comes down to serving and passing,” she said after Thursday’s game against the Southern League’s second-place team Mariposa County. “If you can out serve and out pass your opponents, you might not win but you’re gonna at least compete against them.”
Kootstra talked to her team about it last year and they were very good in both areas, but this season the Knights elevated their game. The added focus is why the team can confidently say it has improved since last year despite losing three seniors that accounted for a lot of last season’s production on a Division IV Sac-Joaquin Section championship team.
The Knights are 14th in the Sac-Joaquin Section, according to MaxPreps rankings.
“We focus a lot on serve and pass,” said junior outside hitter and team leader in kills Jordan Vander Veen. “We’ve definitely had an overall better passing record this year than we did last year.”
Ripon Christian (22-4, 12-0 Southern League) is working on its second straight undefeated league season and extended its win streak to 11 games, sweeping the Grizzlies, 25-4, 25-15, 25-11 on Thursday.
Vander Veen finished with a team-high 15 kills, junior Megan Weststeyn led the Knights with 18 assists and Ava Van Groningen and Leah Van Wyngarden had seven digs each.
The Knights return multiple players from last year’s section championship team and after the high of beating Ripon in the Northern California State playoffs, a second-round loss to University Prep in three sets gives this year’s team something to chase.
“Most of them were on the team that won sections last year, and that went into NorCals and lost against University Prep,” Kootstra said. “I think that creates a fire inside to want to go further to achieve that and do better than what we did last year. It definitely helps having returning players buy into what we’re about.”
Winners of 29 straight league games, the Knights have the chance to go two full seasons without a Southern League loss. They finish the regular season against Delhi on Tuesday and Le Grand on Thursday. After playing bigger, well-established teams in preseason tournaments, the second half of their season is less competitive. They use practice and league games to implement plays that they’ll need in the playoffs.
This year, the team worked on consistency — an area Kootstra says she has seen the team improve on as the season progressed.
“We’re trying to stay in the game no matter what the opposing side looks like, trying to focus on our side only,” senior captain Taylor Postma said. “In practice, we’re really focusing on preparing for what’s next.
“When we’re playing each other in practice, we’re pushing each person to be better no matter what. Coach has been saying focus on the process and where this is going to take us, not necessarily the wins. We want to win but we want to continue the process for future goals.”
Not many schools have a volleyball history like Ripon Christian.
The Knights have a section-best 17 titles and are on the hunt for their 18th. Kootstra won three straight section titles and a state title as a player at Ripon Christian and is looking to lead the team to another section three-peat as a coach.
“Some of the history of what we’ve accomplished as a school helps set the tone for what our program is about,” Kootstra said. “As a coach I think about it … but at the same time we are trying to be excellent at what we do regardless of wins and losses. That includes both play on the court as well as just the character development of these girls.”
