 Welcome into the Coach's Corner. I'm Joe Wamba, joined now with Dave Trumbo, head coach of the women's volleyball team, indoor and beach volleyball, head coach. But we're talking indoor volleyball now. So on Tuesday, you guys host St. Mary's and have a really good result on senior night. Yep, senior night. You just don't know what's going to happen. The lot of distractions, and I didn't like to really do it against a team of St. Mary's quality. And we just seemed very calm. Our passing, we were really calm. And it's a bad omen when you go out and beat them the first set handily, because you know the other teams are like, well, that was embarrassing. We're going to end exactly what they did. And we won both sets two and three by two points. So it was great on senior night to win three-nothing. And that would have really hurt us if we would have lost. And so that was a nice win for us. And credit to the seniors. I mean, they've been here for four years. They know what it's like to win and playing those tough types of matches. And they rose to the occasion. Yeah, all four seniors really played well that night. Jackie Zepa hit 280. And Kelsey Stave, nice good blocking, had some great swings in the middle. Kristen Brooks probably had one of her best nights in her career. She hit 480 and had 13 kills on only 25 swings. And Sarah had her, she was very consistent, had a great night as well. So all four seniors really played well. And they played in all three sets. We love seeing that red hair come out on the court and get on to the right side and throw down those big swings. Well, like I said at senior night, Jackie is the only player that actually has her own personal cheer, which is a direct reflection on the kind of person that Jackie is and how much the team loves her. And the quality personalities across the board on that team, it's great to see them in the camaraderie they have with each other is wonderful. Yeah, and for you to play four years of a college sport, it's tough. It is. It's a lot of hard work and a lot of sacrifice, a lot of fun. But it was great to see them perform that way. And a really competitive four years. And now, speaking of that competitiveness, you guys go to Lebanon Valley and play them in a really tough match. Right, now, we came in, Lebanon Valley's 5-0. We're 6-0, so essentially, if Lebanon Valley wins out, they beat us and Messiah, they win. So we get down two to one. We come out in the first set and dog on if we didn't beat them pretty good again. And then they beat us pretty good on the second set. Third set, 23-23. The kind of sets we usually win didn't do it. Oh boy. And they were able to get themselves together and jump on them quickly in that fourth set. And then midway through that fourth set, Brooks gets her 1,000th kill. So the managers were counting. And so there was a little celebration on the court for her. And I think that even picked us up a little bit. And we end up winning like 25 to 10. And that momentum carried right onto the fifth set. And Gary Storter, headman's basketball coach, said to me, that was amazing that your girls could do that. He goes, they not only had a 41-match winning streak on the line, they had playing for Beata host the Mac Conference Championship if we win in the semifinals and on their court. Right. We were on their court. So it was a real testimony to the belief that they have collectively as a team that they can win. And that home court advantage that you've had for the last four years, or is it five years now? Five now. Five now has been so vital. And this year has been really vital when we get those home games and the men's ice hockey team shows up and everybody's there cheering you on. It does set a tone for what's happening on the court. Yeah, and we can stay right at home if we can win on that Wednesday in the Mac Conference semifinals. We'll play the fourth, fifth play-in game. And then if we can win that, we'll be home on that Saturday at five o'clock right after the football game, which is just like last year. We got a huge crowd, close to 1,000 people. Messiah travels well, and they had a lot of people here last year. And we don't know whether it's gonna be Messiah, Lebanon Valley, because they'll probably be second and third. Right, and that match could also go very tight the way that your guys' match with Lebanon Valley did on Wednesday. Oh, absolutely. Messiah is a really competitive opponent and Lebanon Valley, as their coach, they played their best match of the year. Well, we typically had everybody's best shot. Yeah, yeah. Because they know they're gonna have to play well against us and Lebanon Valley played incredible defense and that was the difference. That and the 17 service errors that we made. That's a tough thing to ever come and we typically don't see that on the stat sheet from our servers. No, we don't, but then our philosophy of serving tough to try to get them out of their system and be able to get a ball back when we serve it, of one that we can transition into our offense and you've got to serve tough and some nights you just don't serve well and it's kind of, it's contagious. And we're trying, and that night just didn't have it. The serving wasn't good and, but thankfully we covered it up with some other things. And the way the schedule has been working out, you guys had three weekends off. In October. In October of all months, too. How does that set you up in ways of preparation for not only the next match coming up, but being able to work on things for the Mac conference tournament coming up in next week? Well, Joe, I really felt like the first seven weeks were grueling. I mean, we were gone every weekend. We were home, we were home one or two, but, and we're going six days a week. So the first break, we really needed it and they came back, they're refreshed, you know? And now the second break is homecoming weekend. We've never been home on homecoming weekend. So I really think they appreciated that. So we're gonna see tonight. But so we're, you know, we probably play Tuesday against Albarnia, then we have a huge match against Hopkins and what we're gonna do right now is fifth in the region. We're ninth, so that could be a huge match for us. And then on Saturday, we'll practice. And so we'll have Saturday, Monday, Tuesday, prepare for the Mac semifinals. So I think we're gonna be refreshed, which is the whole idea and ready to do battle. And after some days off, catch up with some sleep, catch up with some schoolwork, we're gonna be more than ready to defend our championship. And with defending that championship, you guys also not lost a match in the Mac Commonwealth Conference. That's correct. So if we can win it against Albarnia on Tuesday, we will not lost a match. I don't like to even say it out loud. Right. We'll just shy away from that. Yeah, we just, yeah, I really do believe that we, if we execute and we do what we're supposed to, you know, in the team chemistry, how well we play, how hard we play, the winning takes care of itself. We don't really talk about winning a whole lot. Right. If we do the right things, the winning will take care of itself. And the difference maker is the team believes they can win anytime they walk out on the court, even if they're playing each other or, you know, whatever the opponent, yeah. It is competitive. And not too many girls can tease and get on each other and practice like our girls without hurting the other person's feelings. Right. I will back block Anika or Lauren. They like to block Anika. Oh, yeah. And Lauren Weaver will block Anika because those are the right sides, you know, and they let her know about it. You know, and then when they hit and then Anika blocks them, it just makes them better. It does. You know, just makes them better. And so it's very interesting to watch that dynamic and practice which puts each other to be a better volleyball player. Well, on a final note, congratulations to Kristen Brooks on her 1,000th career kill. Couldn't have come at a better time also. And coach, good luck with the rest of the conference calendar, the rest of the season and into the conference tournament. Hopefully we'll be talking next week. We have to. It's a regular thing on Monday. Oh, okay. We have to talk. Okay. All right. He's Dave Trombo. I'm Joe Wallman. This has been the Coaches Corner.