The Kodiak women finally shook the monkey off their back on Jan. 24., claiming their first win of the season with a 3-2 match victory over the Medicine Hat Rattlers in volleyball action.
Joey Sugai
Women’s Kodiak Volleyball
The Kodiak women finally shook the monkey off their back on Jan. 24., claiming their first win of the season with a 3-2 match victory over the Medicine Hat Rattlers in volleyball action.
The host Kodiaks opened up their match with a 2-0 set lead after a strong showing over the Rattlers, winning 25-23 and 28-26 respectively.
The Rattlers wouldn’t slither away after being down 2-0 in sets, as they responded with a win in the next two sets by a 25-17 and 25-15 margin to force a fifth and deciding set.
The Kodiaks found themselves in a tight battle early with a 4-4 tie before taking control of the set to capture their first regular season win of the season, winning the set 15-9 for a 3-2 match win.
After the game, head coach Derek Usman expressed how relieved he was after finally getting the win and still holds optimism and hope for his team as they try to land a playoff spot, but they’d have to win every remaining game to do that.
“It’s great to finally win a match. This has been a long time coming,” says Usman.
“The good thing about it right now is, we dug ourselves a pretty big hole to try to make the playoffs, but if we can get it together here with the five games left, we might sneak in the back door and get a qualification game. If we have everything going, we can roll with it. So, I’m kind0of hoping. This is a big step for this team in terms of getting our role and maybe sneaking into that playoff spot.”
This first win not only relieved and renewed confidence with Usman, but also the players on the team, as well as Kelsey Mirkovich.
“I feel like, at last, our hard work has paid off. It’s definitely something we deserve. It’s like an elephant off our shoulders,” says Mirkovich.
“I think we finally have the momentum that we needed. We have a win under our belt and now we have the confidence that we need, so I think that without a doubt we will be able to win and hopefully in three (sets).”
Overall, Usman was pleased about how his team managed to fight back in the fifth set to pick up its first win.
“Today, we won the close games, which is great, because the whole season we haven’t really won those close games,” says Usman.
“To their credit, it took a lot of character for this team to dominate a fifth set after getting pummeled for two sets. It’s quite impressive.”
It seemed like after the game some of the girls renewed their confidence with the team
However, the next night the Kodiaks women lost in three straight sets back in Medicine Hat (23-25, 18-25, 17-25).
The Kodiaks women will play next on Friday and Feb. 6., when they travel to NAIT for a couple matches.