North Carolina State University Athletics
Sweet: Making Strides in Improvement
9/24/2007 12:00:00 AM | Women's Volleyball
RALEIGH, N.C. - This past week was a step in the right direction for Wolfpack Volleyball. After taking Monday off to rest, we headed into Tuesday’s practice ready to take care of business. We worked hard the whole week on improving our passing, making the right plays on our attacks, and remaining competitive and intense throughout the whole practice. We ended practice Thursday with a team meeting with a sports psychologist. We talked about our team weaknesses and how we could overcome them, and each player told the team what we could do to help them get out of the hole when they are playing a bad game. The meeting really helped us get in the right mindset for our two upcoming matches, and we learned a lot about each other as teammates that night.
This past Friday was a huge learning experience for us as we took on the Clemson Tigers at home. We came out slow and tentative in the first two games of the match, and we couldn’t seem to do anything right. The coaches were frustrated at our inability to incorporate what we had learned and talked about in practice, and we as players were frustrated with our lack of communication and ability to be coached. After the first two games we ran back to the locker room disappointed in ourselves for the way we had been performing. Immediately after sitting down, we all began to recall what we had talked about Thursday in our sports psychology meeting. We realized we had to believe in our ability to be good and use the knowledge we had acquired in our past week of practice and apply it to the match. After all of the players finished conversing about what we needed to do in order to turn the match around, there was little for the coaches to say. They simply reminded us that it takes three games to win and that we needed to pick up our level of play.
In the third game we started out strong and believed in our ability to take care of business. We were back and forth the whole game and led throughout the middle and close to the end of the game. A few errors and a loss of extra subs led the Tigers to come back. We fought point for point but fell short in the end, losing to Clemson 31-29.
After a tough loss to Clemson on Friday, we had to come back on Sunday and play a tough ACC opponent in Georgia Tech. We got off to another slow start in game one, and by game two we were beginning to pick it up again. After our loss in game two, we talked again in the locker room about the slight changes we could make to turn the match around. We again took the talk to heart and came out intense and ready to play in game three. We played with heart and determination, and executed plays that we had worked hard on all week in practice. Our hard work and competitiveness led us to an exciting and well-earned win in game three.
After our boost of energy in game three, we came out in game four ready to challenge them to another competitive game. We battled most of the game and gave them a run for their money, but fell short again in game four to lose the match in four games. After the match we had our usual talk, and the coaches told us how proud they were of our improvements over the past week in practice, and in the past match. We realized even though we ended up with a loss, we took a huge step in the right direction, and as long as we continue down this road, we will have great success in the future.
We are looking forward to this coming week of practice and traveling to Boston College and Maryland. We have high hopes for the upcoming matches, and if we take care of business this week in practice, we should be able to come home to Raleigh with a couple of ACC wins under our belt.
Thank you to all the fans that came out to support us this past weekend. We look forward to seeing you all again when we return home to take on the Duke Blue Devils Thursday, Oct. 4 in Reynolds.
This past Friday was a huge learning experience for us as we took on the Clemson Tigers at home. We came out slow and tentative in the first two games of the match, and we couldn’t seem to do anything right. The coaches were frustrated at our inability to incorporate what we had learned and talked about in practice, and we as players were frustrated with our lack of communication and ability to be coached. After the first two games we ran back to the locker room disappointed in ourselves for the way we had been performing. Immediately after sitting down, we all began to recall what we had talked about Thursday in our sports psychology meeting. We realized we had to believe in our ability to be good and use the knowledge we had acquired in our past week of practice and apply it to the match. After all of the players finished conversing about what we needed to do in order to turn the match around, there was little for the coaches to say. They simply reminded us that it takes three games to win and that we needed to pick up our level of play.
In the third game we started out strong and believed in our ability to take care of business. We were back and forth the whole game and led throughout the middle and close to the end of the game. A few errors and a loss of extra subs led the Tigers to come back. We fought point for point but fell short in the end, losing to Clemson 31-29.
After a tough loss to Clemson on Friday, we had to come back on Sunday and play a tough ACC opponent in Georgia Tech. We got off to another slow start in game one, and by game two we were beginning to pick it up again. After our loss in game two, we talked again in the locker room about the slight changes we could make to turn the match around. We again took the talk to heart and came out intense and ready to play in game three. We played with heart and determination, and executed plays that we had worked hard on all week in practice. Our hard work and competitiveness led us to an exciting and well-earned win in game three.
After our boost of energy in game three, we came out in game four ready to challenge them to another competitive game. We battled most of the game and gave them a run for their money, but fell short again in game four to lose the match in four games. After the match we had our usual talk, and the coaches told us how proud they were of our improvements over the past week in practice, and in the past match. We realized even though we ended up with a loss, we took a huge step in the right direction, and as long as we continue down this road, we will have great success in the future.
We are looking forward to this coming week of practice and traveling to Boston College and Maryland. We have high hopes for the upcoming matches, and if we take care of business this week in practice, we should be able to come home to Raleigh with a couple of ACC wins under our belt.
Thank you to all the fans that came out to support us this past weekend. We look forward to seeing you all again when we return home to take on the Duke Blue Devils Thursday, Oct. 4 in Reynolds.
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