The pictures today are compliments of my niece Jennifer VanBenthuysen who spent most of the day going from court to court tracking down each of the teams and getting a few shots of them.
The 18-1's won their first match of the day against Sunshine. They then had their final match of the pool against TCA. It was an awesome match. The 18-1's lost the first two games and with their backs against the wall they rallied to win games 3 & 4. By this time there were several hundred people standing around the court, on chairs, water barrels, etc, trying to watch this great match. Game five went the distance, with NL at one point being down 14-9 and coming back to 14-13 before TCA put down the final point to win the match. This put the 18-1's 2nd in their pool and they had to play a challenge match at 5pm. They easily won the challenge match against Circle Cirty. They are now in the Gold Championship Bracket and will be playing Vision at 8am on Friday morning in the quarterfinals. Click here to see pictures of the 18-1's from today.
The 18-2's went 1-1 today in their pool play. They then had a challenge match against GI Select. It was a good match and went 3 games, but in the end we lost 15-13. This means the 18-2's will be playing their final JO matches on Friday in Flight 5, going for 37th place. Click here to see pictures of the 18-2's from today.
The 17-1's started their tournament play today. They had two matches today in the 17 Open division, and they took both of them to 5 games. In both matches they lost by just 2 or 3 points in game 5! They are still not out of it, it is just going to be harder for them now as they will need to win virtually all of their matches from here on out. Click here to see pictures of the 17-1's from today.
The 17-2's had a great day today. In their first half of pool play they have gone 3-0. Sean said the team is really clicking well today. They will be completing their inital pool play on Friday. Click here to see pictures of the 17-2's from today.
The 17-3's, my favorite team today.....maybe because I got to sit on the bench and be assistant coach! We started off the day well by defeating Attack in two fairly easy games. Our 2nd match was against TAV. It was a much tougher match, and in the end it came down to us not being as strong at serve receive as we needed to be. We lost that match in two games. At 1-1 on the day, the 17-3 team is still in contention for the Gold. We just need to win at least 2 of our 3 matches on Friday. Click here to see pictures of the 17-3's from today.
The 16-1's finished their intial pool play today. It was a day of "ups and downs" according to Jordan. They had two protests on their court and they won both of them. They ended up winning their last match of the day against 1st Alliance in a close exciting 28-26, 25-23 match. This cinched 3rd in the pool and advances them toward the gold. They will have a 3 team pool on Friday followed by a challenge match. Click here to see pictures of the 16-1's from today.
The 16-2's also finished their initial pool play today. They went 3-2 in their pool, but ended up 4th due to a head to head tie break. This put them out of contention for the Gold, but they will be playing to win the bottom half of the tournament starting with a three team pool on Friday.Click here to see pictures of the 16-2's from today.
The 16-3's had a tough day today. They lost both of their matches and ended up 6th in the pool. They are out of contention for the Gold, but will be playing to win the bottom half of the tournament starting with a three team pool on Friday. They told me even though they hadn't won any matches the first two days, they were still happy that they were here and playing these good teams. And that is what we like to hear. Click here to see pictures of the 16-3's from today.