Vballmokey's Road to Success (454)

One team, one goal: winning state. It is a very difficult thing to do, but it is possible. It takes a lot of determination, hard work, and teamwork. I think we have the capability to stay focused this season and accomplish our goal. There are also smaller goals along the way that helps us get to our goal, like being conference champions. Kennedy volleyball has never been conference champions, except when they tied for it in 2006, so this would be a big accomplishment. In order to be the conference champions we need to have the best conference record, which we are off to a good start to. We have an undefeated conference record of 4-0 so far. We have beaten Linn Mar, Dubuque Walhert, Iowa City West, and Cedar Falls, who was ranked number one at the time. Next Tuesday we play Jefferson at home, which should be a good match for us. 

Tournaments, however, are a different story. We haven't gone undefeated at tournaments, but we have done well. The teams we've lost to in tournament are Valley, Ankeny, Dubuque Hemostead, Cedar Falls (who we later beat in conference), and Bettendorf. We've had the tournaments at Prairie, Valley, Osage, and Dubuque Hempstead. The tournaments are fun for the team; we ride the vans or a bus and get to spend all day together. Also, tournaments are always on Saturdays, which is nice because then you have Sunday to relax and do some homework. 

Another big part of building a championship team is the team chemistry. To help this, we have a lot of team bonding opportunities. Every Monday before game days we have a team dinner after practice. It is usually at someone's house and sometimes a restaurant. We also have team sleepovers, usually after a Saturday tournament. We also have team film sessions. These are at school before or after practice, or they can be at someone's house if the game is on TV, like what we did for Iowa City West. 

We also watched film for Jefferson, who we play on Tuesday. This game, Johnson will be our head coach instead of Goodall. On Sunday, Goodall left to visit the Philippines for a few days. She was asked by USA volleyball to go over on a mission to empower women through sports. Even though there will be a change in coaching, I still think we will play just like we always do. Our team has fun and get really excited for game days. We even have a pre game pump up tradition.  

We definitely have some things to work on and improve if we want to make it to state and do well there, but we have what it takes.