The Dons and the Wildcats faced off on Wednesday, October 20th, in honor of supporting a cure for breast cancer. After the Acalanes freshman and junior varsity teams handily beat their Dougherty Valley opponents, the pressure was on for varsity to maintain the momentum.
Each of the teams sported pink t-shirts with phrases such as “cancer sucks”, “dig for a cure”, and “fight like a girl” to show their support and team spirit . Prior to the game, head coach Steve Siegmann gave a heart warming speech and took a moment to give respect to breast cancer victims, patients, and survivors and encourage the spectators to make donations at the door. The first game began but the Lady Dons quickly fell behind by five points start and Dougherty Valley continued to play strong through the first game. Despite numerous kills by senior Tianna Roy and a few spot-on passes from junior Brooke Aiello, the Dons could not pull through. The first game finished with a score of 15 to 25 in the Wildcats favor, leaving Acalanes players and spectators dazed and confused.
Disappointed by the first game, the girls were sure they could play better and show their true potential. Although determined, the Lady Dons failed to come out strong and remained two points or more behind the Wildcats until the end of game two. The Wildcats only needed one point to win but the Dons weren’t going to give up so quickly. They showed their heart and desire for victory with a six point comeback win. Junior Lisa Carrington and senior Lila Schoenfield scored the last two points with game winning kills putting overall score at one to one.
After securing a win the team appeared to relax which caused them to produce several unforced errors in the two games to come. Siegmann reported that of the one hundred points that Dougherty Valley scored overall, more than seventy of them were errors made by Acalanes. The Dons could not pull through in the final two games and lost the match with Dougherty Valley 3 and Acalanes 1.
“I am really disappointed that we couldn’t get it together and play like I know we can….I think we all had good moments but I think that we couldn’t put it together,” said Carrington. The loss against Dougherty Valley severely lessens the Lady Dons chances of making it to NCS.
“I think that we as a team didn’t connect at all. It was really disappointing that we didn’t win because now in order for us to win in NCS we have to win our upcoming games against Campo and Miramonte which are both going to be very hard teams,” said Aiello.
Natalie Goepel
