On Saturday Dec 29th the Ridgecrest Starlings Volleyball club held their first Friendship Tournament. This was a warm-up tournament for the long competitive Southern California Volleyball Association (SCVA) tournament season which starts the first weekend in January. The day started with a score-keeping clinic to assist new players and coaches with learning how to “keep book” for all their upcoming tournaments.

The tournament included Starlings teams from Ridgecrest, Bishop, Tehachapi, Oak Hills, Palmdale and Victorville. Following the four team pool format used by the SCVA the Ridgecrest Starlings hosted 12 teams divided into three age groups - u14s, u16s and u18s.

The under-14s competed at the Saint Ann Parish Center. Where the Tehachapi-14s won a close fought victory over the Oak Hills-14s in a final match of the day that went 3 games. The Ridgecrest Starlings-14s won a best of three contest in three over Lakeview to finish in 3rd.

The U-16s and the U-18s played at the Kerr McGee Center. Where the Oak Hills-16s finished first with a perfect 3-0 match record and a 6-0 game record sweeping all their opponents in two straight games. The Tehachapi-16s finished in second losing only to Oak Hills. The Ridgecrest-16s won a hard fought three game match over Palmdale to finish third.

In the 18s division the Tehachapi-18s had a great run, winning three straight matches in two games for first place. Palmdale-18s beat the Oak Hills-18s in the only three game match of the day for second, while the Ridgecrest-18s finished fourth.

It was a great day of club volleyball for our local Starlings Volleyball players and their fellow club players from their sister Starlings clubs in the High Desert area.

I want to thank all the players, parents, coaches and volunteers that made this tournament possible - especially the Parks and Recreation Department and the Kerr McGee Center and the Parish of Saint Ann for the use of their courts and facilities. We would especially like thank our volunteer referees for the wonderful job they did keeping us on schedule, playing and competing within rules of the game. Thank you Jim Ledbetter, Bob Maki, Robert McWhorter, and Amanda Cordes. A special thank you to Melanie Rossi and all the parents who planned, organized, and worked to make this tournament happen.

18’s Division

1 Omaha 18 Gold Champion

2 Hacienda Heights A

3 Monrovia

4 Hacienda Heights B

T5 Tijuana

T5 Nashville

7 City of LA Blue 18 Silver Champion

8 San Gabriel

9 Tempe

10 Cudahy

11 Clairemont

12 Oak Hills

13 Central Phoenix 18 Bronze Champion

14 Oakland

15 Oceanside

16 La Puente

17 Watsonville

18 Scripps Ranch

19 Ridgecrest 18 Copper Champion

20 Eastlake

21 National City

22 LA West

23 City of LA Gray

24 Skyline

16’s Division

1 Shonto 16 Gold Champion

2 Tijuana

3 San Gabriel Red

4 South Bay

T5 City of LA Blue

T5 Ridgecrest

T7 Hacienda Heights A

T7 Toledo

9 Tehachapi Diamond 16 Silver Champion

10 Cudahy

11 Nashville

12 Central Phoenix

13 South Central LA 16 Bronze Champion

14 SD City Rachelle

15 City of LA Gray

16 Oak Hills 15’s

17 Brevard County 16 Copper Champion

18 Hacienda Heights B

19 University City

20 Tehachapi Gold

21 Phoenix Doug 16 Flight 2 Champion

22 SD Navajo Dennis

23 Clairemont

24 Tehachapi Silver

25 Oak Hills 16’s 16 Flight 3 Champion

26 Oceanside

27 Eastlake Monik

28 Eastlake Lindsay

29 Oakland 16 Flight 4 Champion

30 San Gabriel White

31 National City

32 Mission Bay

33 SD City Will

34 Phoenix Kelly

14’s Division

1 Phoenix Nick 14 Gold Champion

2 South Mountain

3 City of LA

4 Tuba City

T5 South Bay

T5 High Desert

T7 Tijuana

T7 University City Dave

9 San Gabriel Red 14 Silver Champion

10 University City Aaron

11 Hacienda Heights A

12 SD Navajo Randy

13 Lemon Grove

14 Phoenix September

15 Hacienda Heights B 14 Bronze Champion

16 Santee

17 SD Navajo Marv/Ken

18 South Central

19 Phoenix Ben

20 SD Navajo Rich

21 Oceanside 14 Copper Champion

22 Tehachapi

23 SD Navajo Bob

24 Shonto

25 Ridgecrest 14 Flight 2 Champion

26 Eastlake Sandra

27 Oakland

28 Nashville

29 San Gabriel White 14 Flight 3 Champion

30 Oak Hills 14’s

30 South Bay

30 Clairemont

33 Oak Hills 13’s 14 Flight 3 Champion

34 Skyline

35 Eastlake Victoria

36 University City Liz

37 Eastlake Chelsea

12’s Division

1 Mobile 12 Gold Champion

2 Lemon Grove

3 Phoenix Adam

4 Monrovia

5 South Bay 12 Silver Champion

6 San Gabriel

7 LA West

8 Oakland

9 Phoenix Bernice 12 Bronze Champion

10 SD Navajo

11 Tuba City

12 Eastlake Ron

13 Tehachapi 12 Copper Champion

14 Eastlake Rachel

15 Phoenix Jen

 

 

The Ridgecrest Purple Starlings 14-year old Purple team won a grueling 3-day International Tournament in San Diego this weekend. 

 

The first day of the tournament was pool play at the Balboa Park Facility.  Fortunately the temperature was mild so the inside was only uncomfortably warm (last year the place was a Sauna).

 

The Starlings faced Oak hills in the First Match.  There was no idea as to the quality of the competition as teams were placed in each pool seemingly randomly.

 

The first game was a decisive 25-10 win by the Purples with Jazmine Stenger-Smith leading with 9 serves and 1 ace, followed by 7 serves and 12 aces by Michaela Metcalf.

The Starlings followed up with another decisive victory  lead by Becca Stoffel with 10 serves and 1 ace and solid defense by Libero Grace Tesdall

 

The Purples then faced Daly City in the Second Match.  The first game was another decisive victory (25-8) lead by Bridget Ingle with 8 serves and 4 aces and strong play by Brooke Nelepovitz.   6 of Daly City’s points came off Starlings service errors.  The coaches kept saying “now’s the time to get the service errors out of the way, we can’t do this later”.  The second game was another 25-10 victory with 5 of Daly City’s 10 points coming off Starlings’ service errors.   The Starlings were dominating play and were encouraged to experiment with serving so the errors were acceptable. 

 

The Third Match was against Oceanside and featured Barthol as the substitute coach.  The Starlings really dominated play again winning 25-8.  Allie Sliva was the hot server with 9 serves and 3 aces with Becca Stoffel adding 2 kills.  There were only 3 service errors.  The second game featured 5 Starlings service errors, due mostly to experimentation as the Starlings shot out to a 10-2 lead behind strong serving by Jazmine Stenger-Smith, great net presence by Michaela Metcalf and Bridget Ingle and solid defense by Libero Grace Tesdall. 

 

The 3-0 Match record placed the Starlings in the upper division of the tournament among the top 24 of the more than 50 teams.  This figured to be stronger competition as it was pool play against all the 1^st and 2^nd place finishers of Day 1. 

 

Day 2 started with the usual Starlings 9 am fog, which was now noticeable due to the stiffer competition. 

 

 

The Starlings faced  Santa Ana in the first Match.  Santa Ana had some tall players who tipped quite a bit.  The Purples struggled early, getting behind by a few points but rallied around Michaela Metcalfs strong serving with 7 serves and 3 aces, some solid defensive play by Libero Grace Tesdall, and some good battling at the net by Bridget Ingle.  With only 3 service errors, the Starlings pulled out at 25-23 victory.  Game 2 featured some very solid play by the Purples—in fact both teams played quite well.  Lead by Brooke Nelepovitz’s 8 serves and 2 aces, some solid play by Allie Sliva and only 1 service error, the Starlings went on to win 25-21.  This was one of the few (fortunately) cases were there were 2 obvious missed calls by Up Ref (both the Line Judge and the Down Ref agreed)—both against the Starlings.  However, the Starlings hung in to win. 

 

The Starlings then faced a very mobile Navajo Bob team.  Game 1 was a close 25-23 victory, with both teams on their toes. Allie Sliva lead with 6 serves and 2 aces and strong play at the net by Bridget Ingle paved the way to a Purple Victory.

  

The second game featured the highlight play of the entire tournament:  Libero Grace Tesdall made a diving save on a ball that was very well hit by the Navajo Bob team.  Grace’s save sent the ball spinning high up in the air, with the hope of giving a team mate time to get there.  Setter Jazmine Stenger-Smith was close behind Grace.  Grace kept her eye on the path of the ball and rolled out of Jazmine’s way, enabling Jazmine to make a desperate pass to Middle Michaela Metcalf.  Michaela then passed a spinning free ball lowover the net and the ball hit the floor on the opponent’s side for the Starlings’ 24^th point.  This seemed to take the wind out of the Navajo Bob team and the Starlings went on to win 25-15.

 

The final match of the day was going to be interesting.  Due to the Nature of pool play, the Purples were already guaranteed first place in the pool.  The Purples were not told this (although most of them suspected something).  The Purples came out strong defeating Santee Kelvin 25-14 despite 5 service errors.  The second game was also a decisive 25-13 Purple victory despite 5 service errors.  Strong serving by Michaela Metcalf and Brooke Nelepovitz with Bridget Ingle contributing 3 kills were featured in this final game. 

 

During Day 2 several of the coaches and parents were hearing some very complimentary things about the Purples, in the form of “Watch out for Ridgecrest Purples” and “They are winning”.  One of the referees complimented the Purples on their  sportsmanship, playing as a team, and overall skill.

 

This first place finish on Day 2 guaranteed a 6^th place or higher finish for the Purples; they were then sent to very grueling double elimination bracket play against the 5 other first place finishers of the other pools.

 

The first Match was against an extremely mobile and energetic team from Tijuana.  The Purples seemed to remember their old 9-am-start-habits and made many unforced errors (the exception being only 2 service errors).  The coaches had to use both time outs to try to stop runs by Tijuana.  The Starlings appeared to improve, but lost the first game 21-25.  The second game saw the Purples awaken a bit.  The Starlings roared out to a 6-0 lead behind Captain Jazmine Stenger-Smith’s strong service with 3 aces.  Key kills by Becca Stoffel, Brooke Nelepovitz and Allie Sliva; great touches/blocks by Michaela Metcalf and Bridget Ingle and several diving passes by Grace Tesdall lead to a 25-19 victory with only 2 service errors.  The tiebreaker was a real nail-biter.  Both teams traded the lead, and the coaches had to use both time outs to stop runs by Tijuana.  Strong play all around with only 1 missed serve lead to a 15-13 Starlings victory.    We all liked this team from Mexico and were wishing them the best.

 

 

Match 2 was against Hacienda Heights.  The first game featured Strong serving by Allie Sliva and Brooke Nelepovitz, with a great joust by Bridget Ingle on game point.  The Starlings won 25-19 with the 5 service errors making the game closer than it seemed.  Hacienda Heights put up more of a challenge in game 2 and the coaches had to use both time outs.  Strong serving by Becca Stoffel (8 serves and 2 aces) and Michaela Metcalf (5 serves with 3 aces), 2 kills by Bridget Ingle and solid overall play by Allie Sliva, Brooke Nelepovitz, Jazmine Stenger-Smith and Grace Tesdall lead to a 25-21 Purple victory with only 3 service errors.

 

The Third Match was against a very tall (some girls were over 6’) and very numerous (15 girls) Oakland team.  The Purples seemed a bit overwhelmed at first; again both timeouts were needed especially after the Starlings were down by 10-18, but strong serving by Michaela Metcalf and Brooke Nelepovitz and solid defensive play by Libero Grace Tesdall gave the Starlings a hard-fought 25-23 victory with 3 service errors.  This was also one of the few matches were the Starlings benefited from service errors of the opposing team.  Oakland roared to life during game 2, defeating the Starlings 25-19.  Oakland seemed to have a knack for passing/tipping/setting the ball just inside the back line.  The coaches counseled an adjustment for the tiebreaker.  During the tiebreaker the Starlings were to watch Oakland’s setter to see if she made a move to pass to a hitter or to set the ball towards the Starlings back row.  This adjustment seemed to help.  The Starlings jumped out to a 6-1 lead behind strong serving by Jazmine Stenger-Smith (6 serves and 3 aces) and later by  Michaela Metcalf with 7 flawless serves in a row.   Solid play by Becca Stoffel, Allie Sliva, Brooke Nelepovitz, Bridget Ingle and many diving passes by Grace Tesdall kept the Starlings in the lead. This game also featured a very scary book-keeping error.  The Starlings were up 13-7, but then the score board showed only a 11-9 starling lead.  The referee had to intervene.  The rules state that the scoreboard must reflect what the book says.  After much consultation the ‘by the book score’ was set to be 13-9 Starlings.  This did not sit well with many of us; however, it had to be accepted.    The Starlings went on to win 15-10.  This victory guaranteed the Starlings a worst-case 2^nd place finish. 

 

 

The Championship Match was against a very tough and resilient team from Shonto.  To many people’s relief, there were official line judges, down refs, score keepers and even a highlight announcer.   Shonto played only 5 players on the court as their squad had several injuries.  The Starlings played quite well with kills by Michaela Metcalf, Jazmine Stenger-Smith and Allie Sliva, solid passing by Becca Stoffel and Brooke Nelepovitz and several diving saves by Grace Tesdall, and a solid service run by Bridget Ingle.  The Starlings 25-16 victory (with 5 Starling service errors) served as a wake-up call to Shonto.  Much to the injured player’s credit, Shonto played a squad of 6 during game 2.  The Starlings couldn’t quite catch up, despite both time outs being used, and lost 18-25. 

The tiebreaker was an incredible tension-filled event.  The crowd was buzzing and the coaches’ hearts were racing (this is not a time to take one’s blood pressure).  If the Starlings won, they would get first.  If the Starlings lost, they still had a chance at first, but they would have to win the tiebreaker game (a game to 25).    The teams went back and forth for the first couple points.  Then Brooke Nelepovitz started a service run of 6 serves and 1 ace, which gave the Starlings a 7-2 lead.  Some diving saves by Grace Tesdall, solid play by Jazmine Stenger-Smith, Becca Stoffel, Bridget Ingle and Allie Sliva and a key kill by Michaela Metcalf then gave the Starlings a well-deserved 15-8 victory.

 

 

The announcement came over the loudspeaker:

 

Congratulations Ridgecrest Purple Starlings; the Under 14 National Champions!

 

There wasn’t a dry eye in Ridgecrest.

 

 

 

 

 

Individual player  highlights for the tournament.

 

Middle Michaela Metcalf had some tremendous blocks, lead the team in touches, and was a force at the net.  She had 97 total serves, 19 aces and 8 kills.  She had a key kill off a Shonto over-pass at the beginning of the Championship game.

 

Setter and Co-Captain Becca Stoffel had some great sets and great passes. She had 78 serves 16 aces and 5 kills. 20% of her serves were aces.  She also had a kill that walked across the net during the Championship game that kept momentum for Ridgecrest.

 

Libero Grace Tesdall was all over the floor and made over 27 diving passes to keep the ball in play.  Many of those dives looked painful.  Many of her passes come of strong hits or tricky passing by the other team.   Grace had a key desparation return for a point that prevented a Shonto comeback.

 

Setter and Captain Jazmine Stenger-Smith kept the team on track and was a solid setter.  She had 107 serves 15 aces and 4 kills.  She had a serving percentage of 96 and missed only 4 serves the entire tournament.

 

Outside Hitter Brooke Nelepovitz had some outstanding kills, tips and some great service runs.  She also had some key hits and kills that kept the opposing team ‘off system’. She had 95 serves 16 aces and 15 kills. 

 

Outside Hitter Allie Sliva had some great serving runs, solid athletic play and some key kills and tips. She had 71 serves, 14 aces and 10 kills.  Allie also served up a service ace for the Championship point.

 

Middle Bridget Ingle had some great kills and won many battles (called jousting) at the net against much taller players.  She had 59 serves 6 aces and 11 kills. 

 

Nice work Purples!

 

Dr. John D. “The Punisher” Stenger-Smith

Congratulations to the Ridgecrest Starlings 14s Purple Team on winning the Starlings National Tournament in San Diego this weekend.  Details and photos and news articles forthcoming.

I am very proud of you all!   The Punisher

There was a professional photogragher at Nationals that was donating his time to take pictures of the event.  He posted them online.  This was the only one that showed any of our club.

Sunday morning found our 14s team facing an also undefeated team from Omaha Nebraska.  At first look these two teams seemed fairly well matched.  Both had some big hitters and fast defenders.  Overall they were both good solid teams of 13 and 14 year old volleyball players.  In the first game our Ridgecrest team had some control problems with their serving and a hard time settling into a hitting rhythm.  They lost this game 19-25.  They second game our Ridgecrest team struggled their way to a 21-25 loss and their first match loss of the week.

This loss put our 14s team immediately back on the court, in the losers bracket, to face the same Phoenix team from Saturday.  It was a different day but the same results - Ridgecrest won 25-20 and 25-14.
Our Ridgecrest Starlings 14s tournament ended an hour later when they had to play the team from Omaha one more time.  This time the emotions of the day and the long weekend finally caught up with our team and they lost this rematch 14-25 and 17-25.  This loss put our Ridgecrest Starlings 14s team in second place for the tournament.

Second place in the Starlings National Championships was a great finish of what had been a good season for our 14s team.

On Sunday our 13s team played a single match against a Navajo Starlings team from San Diego.  This was another pair of close games and another close loss for our 13s team.  This loss ended our 13s team National Championship.
The Ridgecrest Starlings 13s ended the weekend in 4th place in the Silver Division and a 10th place overall in the 14 and under division of the tournament.

On Saturday evening while most of our Starlings players were relaxing and getting ready for their matches on Sunday six of our players and all of our coaches were attending a high performance tryout at the Alliant Center.  We were allowed to send only two girls per team to this tryout.  Chris the 16s coach decided to send Sammi and Mandy,  I sent Ashley and Alyssa from the 14s team and Megan sent Brooke and Rebecca from the 13s team.

All our girls worked really hard.  The coaches had to work two as we were recruited to run most of the drills the girls were performing.

An unexpected treat was that they tryouts were evaluated by the USA Volleyball youth A1 team.  This is a team of the top 16 and 17 year old players in the country.  This gave our players the opportunity to see how some of the top players in the country practice and play.

Day Three was a day of looking forward for our teams.  The 13s were looking for a high silver division finish.  The 14s were looking to stay in the hunt for a gold medal finish.  The 16s were looking to continue their good play from day 2 and end their season on a high note - playing together and having fun as a team.

All three teams got what they were looking for.

The 13s started the day officiating a match between Apple Valley and the same South Bay team that our 14s had defeated the day before.  After South Bay won the match easily our very young 13s team took the court against a significantly older, larger and stronger team.  I didn’t get to see this match as I was coaching the 14s at the time.  But everyone tells me that it was the best two games of volleyball our 13s played all season.  Unfortunately they were not able to pull off a win, but they gave that South Bay team a scare.  Our 13s lost that match 23-25, 23-25.  They don’t get any closer than that.  They lost, but the 13s weekend is not over.  They play a team from Navajo/San Diego on Sunday morning for third place in the Silver Division and a 9th place overall finish in the tournament.

The 14s team also had to ref the opening match of the day against the Tehachapi team that had sent our 13s team into the Silver Division on Friday and a team from Phoenix AZ.  This game had a lot of history for our team.  Tehachapi had beaten our 13s, and last year a team from Phoenix had ended our 14s team run in the Nationals Tournament.  Phoenix won that first game.  My 14s were a little stiff from sitting and standing around scorekeeping and started a little slow.  But once they got woke up they started really playing the games just flew by.  We didn’t play our best volleyball this day, but it was good enough for a 25-18, 25-17 sweep and a place in the semi finals on Sunday where we will play a team from Omaha that, like us, has not lost a match in this tournament.

Our 16s had a long day they were playing at Balboa Park in the flight 2 bracket.  But they made the best of their opportunities beating two different teams from the San Gabriel Starlings and finally sweeping a team from the Scrips Ranch Starlings to finish 1st in their bracket and a 25th overall place in the tournament.  But more importantly, they played well, they played like a team, and they had fun doing it.

This is our 16s team shortly after their Friday comeback.

Sorry this will have to be quick - breakfast starts in 10 minutes and after two days of volleyball from early morning to late night I havn’t had much time to do anything else.

Day 1

Our 13s team really shocked some teams today.  They started out a second seed in their pool.  After blowing out a couple teams in the first two matches they ran into a bakerfield team in the third match.  After splitting the first two games they played a barn burner of a deciding game.  Exchanging points back and forth this third game to 15 was eventually tied up at 17-17.  That is when Maddy Perez, who just two weeks ago was struggling just to get her overhand serves to the net calmly walked back to the service line and fired an ace to give her team a 1 up advantage.  Then she fired another overhand serve that Bakersfield managed to return, which is when Maddy made a key dig to keep the ball alive, so Allie Sliva could put the game/match winning spike away.  The 13s went 3-0 for first place in their pool.

The 14s only had one hiccup in their day when their coach decided to try some experimenting late in the day.  After winning their first two matches easily and taking the first game of their third match their coach (thats me by the way) decided to give in their demands and let several players play different positions on the court than the ones I think they should be playing.  A late rally made the score not quite as scary as it had been most of the game but they still lost.  So we went back to what has been working for us to easily win the third game and end day one with a 3-0 first place finish in our opening pool.

The 16s make a tactical error on day one.  They had a late start (3 PM) so they filled in their morning by going to the beach.  There is a lot of hard feelings over this day and the way they played and I’m not going to go into things here because my opinion is not very popular amoung the parents, coaches and players right now.  But they showed up for their tournament, tired, sunburned and did not play well.  It was a late night but ended with a lot of crying players, frustrated parents and coaches.  They finished 4th in their pool.

Day 2

The 13s team was again the number two seed in their pool and they handled their first two matches with their usual fire and determination.  But near the end of match two Brooke, one of their two setters banged a knee very hard into the floor.  She tried playing in the third match but struggled.  So without her on the court her team played a tough Tehachapi team to a close loss.  This put them into a three way tie in their pool at 2-1 which they lost the points tiebreaker to Tehachapi.  So our 13s move onto today as the number two seed in the Silver divison of the tournament.

The 14s were all business all day.  After easily beating a team from San Diego and some old friends from the High Desert Team from Victorville.  We moved onto match three against South Bay.  South Bay has been ranked just above out team all season in the SCVA rankings and we knew this was going to be a tough match.  The first game went back and forth exchanging points all the way to 20-20, then we squeaked out a two point advantage and rode it all the way to a win.  In the second game, we gave South Bay an early 5 point lead and then started exchanging points again.  Somewhere around 16-12 however our team finally decided that I had not been lying to them all day when I incessantly nagged that they were the better team.  At the same time South Bay got just a little panicky and starting hitting balls out of bounds.  My excited, and hard playing girls steamrolled the rest of that game to a 25-19 victory, their second first place finish of the week and the number one seeding the the gold medal bracket for today.

The 16s really redeamed themselves on day two.  They showed up for their pool rested, relaxed and having fun.  They squeeked out a close first match win in three over a team from New York.  Then they won an easy match against a young Tehachapi team and ended the day with a 3 game win over a team from NW Kern.  They finished first in their pool.  While the championships of the tournament are not available to them, they really rebounded well from Thursday and everyone was glad to see them playing well and having fun again.