The Estevan Comprehensive School (ECS) Elecs junior girls volleyball team made it all the way to the final in their district championship they hosted Thursday but ran out of gas once there.
Still, getting to the final of the eight-team tournament was a great step for the girls as they faced a strong Weyburn team that won the final against them in straight sets 25-14, 25-5.
“I think the girls performed very well,” said Elecs head coach Tamara Franklin. ”They had a pretty good, strong year throughout. We had a huge group of talented Grade 9s and a couple of Grade 10s… so we were a younger group that came in with a lot of skill.”
The girls had a 5-1 record in the round robin in their sets, earning first place and a direct ticket to the semifinal.
“Winning the round robin and taking first place actually brought a sense of encouragement and pride to know that we could get that far,” said Franklin. “Every time we’ve come to different types of tournaments, we’ve always come up a bit short and never finished at the top.”
In the round robin, the girls beat Carnduff in straight sets (25-12, 25-19), Moosomin in straight sets (25-20, 25-18) and tied Radville (23-25, 25-20). So instead of having first place as a goal to never quite be able to reach, there they were.
“It’s a good feeling to know that if you finish first in the pool you can actually advance in the tournament,” Franklin said.
But once in the semifinal they played a tough Carlyle team that won the first set. They ended up winning (14-25, 25-22, 15-9) against Carylle, with only six players that played as hard as any of the eight teams.
“The turnaround came when a couple of the girls said ‘Hey, I’m ready to be out there, coach, I want to play,’” said Franklin. “Knowing that they were mentally into it (showed) me that I could trust them and sure enough they pulled it off.”
The Weyburn game saw a few unforced errors and a string of serves from Weyburn’s Makenna Ling that caused great difficulty for the Elecs. The Eagles went through their pool at the round robin undefeated and beat Radville in straight sets in the semifinal before sweeping the Elecs.
This tournament was the end of the road for the Eagles and Elecs, as junior teams in SHSAA don’t make it past districts, but it was a very good year for the young team.
“I just asked them if they would return for next year and if they could that’d be awesome,” said Franklin. “I think we’d be that much further into getting a championship at districts.”
