Pride volleyball season successful

At this time last year, Pride Varsity Volleyball would’ve been done with their seasons for about two weeks. This year, though, the team made it into the top 16 of the state–something they haven’t seen since 1997.

“We did so awesome,” said Taine Merganthaler, coach. “I’m proud to call this MY team.”

The girls are proud, too. “I don’t even believe we did it [went so far in the season]. I didn’t think we were bad, but that far? It was pretty sweet,” said Samara Brown, sophmore.

From the beginning of the season, the team was victorious. In one of their first games they played, they played Green Hope, a very strong team and they gave them a rough time, sadly ending in a loss.

After the loss to Green Hope, the girls went on a five-game winning spree in the Cap-8.

But that ended with a disappointed loss to Wakefield, 3-0.

“We could’ve won, but we just didn’t bring the heat,” said Zipporah Foster.

Later in the season, the team was defeated by lower-ranked Enloe — this was a turnaround point for the team.  For the game, one of the Pride’s captains wasn’t present which lead to the loss. “We just shut down. We weren’t used to playing without Kati,” said Samara Brown, sophomore.
On Oct 6, though, the Pride found its mojo. They beat the undefeated, number one team in the conference–Wakefield.

“Everyone was on their game,” said Coach Merganthaler.

At this point in the season, the girls had played their arch-rival Millbrook once, and they came to beat them two other times in the season– putting the Pride in second in the Cap-8.

Leesville and Wakefield were the two teams in the Cap-8 championships. The libero, Kati Stammen, junior, was injured in the first game, putting the Pride at a disadvantage. Luckily, Rachael Essary, freshman, was ready to take her spot on the court.

The Pride sadly lost in the championship game, but they still continued to place tenth in the 4A and nineteenth in the state.