MULTNOMAH ATHLETIC CLUB: 16's Black started the new year with a bang by winning 1st place at the MAC Friendship Tournament on Saturday, January 7th. 

The format for the friendship tournament was as follows: 3 games no matter what in pool play, 2 to 25 and 1 to 15, and regular 2 out of 3 in bracket play.  There were 13 teams at this tournament.  We were the first seed in our pool and we opened with CCVC Black.  We came out with some strong serving by Shelby and Jensen.  CCVC kept it close with strong serving as well, but we took the first set 25-18.  We mixed up our line up and gave them a different look in the second set.  A few crucial missed opportunities and we lost 24-26.  The third set to 15 started off close, but a couple calls against us and some miss communication resulted in a 11-15 loss.  Our second match was against Webfoot Black.  The girls came out with lots of energy and handled Webfoot pretty well, winning all three set, in convincing fashion.  Our final match of pool play was against Mid Valley Gold.  They were a very scrappy team with some tough little servers.  Both Julia and Caroline passed in serve receive wonderfully, which set us up for some great offense out of middle blockers Erica and Cassidy.  It was a great team effort, winning all three sets of that match.  We ended as the #4 seed after pool play and headed for an 8 team Championship Bracket.   

After lunch, we entered bracket play against the #5 seed WVVC Silver.  We started a bit sluggish after a long break, but then got back into our groove and won 25-15, 25-18.  All day we kept reinforcing to the girls to focus on our side of the net and that it didn't matter what kind of volleyball was happening on the other side, we would keep playing our nice and clean and simple volleyball.  We then moved into the semi-finals against Mid Valley Gold, which we had already played during pool play!  They were seeded #8 and beat #1 PDX for a spot in the semi-finals.  We knew they had a lot of confidence with just beating the #1 seed and they also wanted some revenge on us from pool play.  The first set was back and forth the entire way, until we pulled away with the 25-22 win.  In the second set, they built an early 5 point lead, but that didn't stop us.  Some scrappy defense of our own and some clutch long rally wins came in our favor and we held on for a 25-19 victory.  On to the Championship Match!  We faced the 19th ranked CEVA team of Mid Valley Black for a one set match to 25 for the Championship!  It had been a long day for everyone, starting the final match at 7pm.  We came out on fire and took a commanding lead, which then resulted in a 25-16 VICTORY, and some cool bags! :)          

Overall, it was a good day!  We know what parts of our game we need to improve on in practice these next few weeks, which is good.  Starting off the tournament with an early loss really motivated the team to come together and play as one unit.  With so many girls on the team battling for playing time, we believe that the competition in practice for spots on the court will only make our team stronger and better competitors in the end.  Hollen and I are very excited to have this great group of girls and we look forward to moving up from our #22 ranking at our first Power League on January 22nd.