North Carolina State University Athletics
Sweet: Improving Each Weekend
9/4/2007 12:00:00 AM | Women's Volleyball
Follow freshman Nikki Sweet's first year with the Wolfpack program each week via the NC State volleyball blog on GoPack.com. Nikki will keep fans up to speed on the latest happenings of the team; discussing practices, training, matches and much more.
RALEIGH, N.C. - After arriving home from the NC Central tournament, we knew exactly what we needed to work on in the next week of practice. We took last Sunday off in order to rest our bodies, and then Monday we were back at it with lifting and film, followed by individual practices. Our individual practices went well. Each group, whether it was the defensive specialists or the middle blockers, took the time to work on technical details, which would be beneficial to our overall game. On Tuesday we got back onto the court as a team and stepped up our practice by working on areas in which we had struggled with in the previous tournament. We had another intense practice Wednesday, which instilled what we had worked on Tuesday, and ended our practice week on a good note.
Thursday morning was exciting yet stressful for us. It was our first out of state tournament and the first time we would be flying together as a team. We woke up around 9:00 a.m., packed our travel bags and then rushed off to the locker room to quickly pack our volleyball equipment. Our minds were running frantically through our checklists over and over again to ensure that we wouldn't forget anything because once we left the locker room, there was no turning back. After we were done reassuring ourselves that we had everything we needed, we loaded the vans and drove off to the airport to catch our flight to Florida. We eventually arrived in Florida around 6:00 p.m., checked into our hotel, and then headed off for a team dinner at a friendly Italian restaurant. After that we headed back to the hotel to get some rest before our two matches the next day.
On Friday we played two matches, one against Santa Clara and one against the University of Florida. In the morning we played Santa Clara and we battled hard with them and even lead in both games two and three, however we came up short and lost the match in three games. We were happy with our overall performance because we improved in the areas that we had struggled in during the previous tournament. We were, however, disappointed with our loss.
Later that evening we played No. 7 Florida and it was an amazing experience. The gym was loud and packed with fans, cheerleaders, camera crews, and a band. Our goal for the match was to follow our scouting report, execute what we had been working on all week in practice, and simply have fun. We accomplished each one of these goals, and even though we came out of the match with a loss, our team walked out with a sense of pride from having the opportunity to play such an accomplished team in an intense atmosphere.
We ended the tournament on Saturday with another loss against Georgia Southern. It was a disappointing match for us because we only beat ourselves, but we will take the experience and grow from it. We ended the tournament on an upsetting note, but overall the tournament went well and we made the necessary improvements from our last tournament.
This coming weekend we will host a tournament here in Raleigh on campus. We are looking forward to our first home matches and some great volleyball, so please come out to support the team. We hope to see you there.
RALEIGH, N.C. - After arriving home from the NC Central tournament, we knew exactly what we needed to work on in the next week of practice. We took last Sunday off in order to rest our bodies, and then Monday we were back at it with lifting and film, followed by individual practices. Our individual practices went well. Each group, whether it was the defensive specialists or the middle blockers, took the time to work on technical details, which would be beneficial to our overall game. On Tuesday we got back onto the court as a team and stepped up our practice by working on areas in which we had struggled with in the previous tournament. We had another intense practice Wednesday, which instilled what we had worked on Tuesday, and ended our practice week on a good note.
Thursday morning was exciting yet stressful for us. It was our first out of state tournament and the first time we would be flying together as a team. We woke up around 9:00 a.m., packed our travel bags and then rushed off to the locker room to quickly pack our volleyball equipment. Our minds were running frantically through our checklists over and over again to ensure that we wouldn't forget anything because once we left the locker room, there was no turning back. After we were done reassuring ourselves that we had everything we needed, we loaded the vans and drove off to the airport to catch our flight to Florida. We eventually arrived in Florida around 6:00 p.m., checked into our hotel, and then headed off for a team dinner at a friendly Italian restaurant. After that we headed back to the hotel to get some rest before our two matches the next day.
On Friday we played two matches, one against Santa Clara and one against the University of Florida. In the morning we played Santa Clara and we battled hard with them and even lead in both games two and three, however we came up short and lost the match in three games. We were happy with our overall performance because we improved in the areas that we had struggled in during the previous tournament. We were, however, disappointed with our loss.
Later that evening we played No. 7 Florida and it was an amazing experience. The gym was loud and packed with fans, cheerleaders, camera crews, and a band. Our goal for the match was to follow our scouting report, execute what we had been working on all week in practice, and simply have fun. We accomplished each one of these goals, and even though we came out of the match with a loss, our team walked out with a sense of pride from having the opportunity to play such an accomplished team in an intense atmosphere.
We ended the tournament on Saturday with another loss against Georgia Southern. It was a disappointing match for us because we only beat ourselves, but we will take the experience and grow from it. We ended the tournament on an upsetting note, but overall the tournament went well and we made the necessary improvements from our last tournament.
This coming weekend we will host a tournament here in Raleigh on campus. We are looking forward to our first home matches and some great volleyball, so please come out to support the team. We hope to see you there.
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