The Liberty Christian volleyball program not only won the Metro Athletic Conference tournament this past weekend, but they had the satisfaction of beating two opponents they had previously lost to in order to reach the champion status.
The Eagles had played Eagle Ridge Christian and Heritage Classic Christian early in their
season, dropping both games. However, on Oct. 12 they defeated both teams 3-2 and 3-1.
“They played very well as a group and things were just clicking. They were pretty happy being able to beat the number one and number two seed in the tournament,” Head Coach Dakota Ball said.
Senior Raelee Bruno noted the team was able to beat both Eagle Ridge and Heritage once they changed their mindset.
“We came with the mindset of no matter what, we’re going to have a good time. Once we had that, we just kept scoring and eventually our energy just shut the other team down,” Bruno said.
The Eagles had a rocky start to the season, dropping their first three games. However, after making some changes within their rotation and as more players developed their skills, things started to flow.
In the past month, Liberty Christian has only lost three out of 12 games, earning a 12-9 record before they head into the state tournament.
“They’ve really come together as a whole. As far as we knew, the hitting was going to be there this year, but we did not expect the way they have all gelled,” Ball said. “As far as defensively, being able to kill rallies on the defensive side of the net has been nothing but sounding.”
With their regular season over and a conference title under their belts, the Eagles are feeling good going into the MCSAA state volleyball tournament that will take place on Oct. 24 through Oct. 26.
“I’m excited. Hopefully we get a win, and if not, we just want to play the best we can and have a great time,” Bruno said.
Liberty Christian did move into Division I this year after previously being in Division II. Ball noted they will see some teams they have not played before from various parts of the state. However, the goal of taking home first place remains intact.
“There’s a lot of pressure riding on these girls on just being able to adapt and being able to change game plans on the fly, so it’ll be fun to see how they adapt to the pressure of it,” Ball said.
