Immediately following her team’s humiliating 25-10 loss in the first game of its match against Shawnee Heights Tuesday night, Emporia High coach Kendra Bloomquist was fuming.
Bloomquist believed her team had given up during the game, and so the visibly frustrated Bloomquist made her team run from baseline to baseline 10 times, and even ran a couple herself when she saw some of the girls lagging behind.
“If I can do it,” Bloomquist yelled, “you can do it.”
Even though Emporia went on to lose the match, 2-0, the Spartans got their coach’s message loud and clear. They played with more energy in the second game, and despite losing, 25-21, Bloomquist was at least pleased to see her team respond to her ire.
“It was a lack of effort, a lack of intensity, and I told the girls I won’t accept not competing,” Bloomquist said. “We rolled over and played dead in that first game. When they put their minds to it, they can do some things, but that want-to has got to be there.”
The match with Shawnee Heights was a microcosm of the night for Emporia (5-12), playing host to the Emporia Quad, as the Spartans at times played with fire and energy, while at other times looked weary and downtrodden.
“We go up against great teams all season long,” Bloomquist said. “We’ve got to be scrappier and have a better go at it and be more competitive than the other teams, and try to make that an X-factor for us. We didn’t have it at all at times and at other times we showed what we could do.”
Emporia High began the quad with a 2-1 comeback victory over Junction City.
The Spartans lost the first game of the match, 26-24, after sloppy play negated any chance the Spartans had of playing consistently.
“To say it was sluggish would be very generous,” Bloomquist said. “We were way out of sync and had trouble getting anything going.”
The Spartan rallied in Game 2, though, thanks to six Junction City attacking errors and the play of Tiffany Chalupa, who recorded four kills in a 25-18 win.
The Spartans had 11 kills and five service aces to take Game 3, 25-9, earning the victory over the Blue Jays.
“We got some good swings in that game, but we played pretty ugly,” senior Cali Schelling said.
In the second match against Hayden, the Spartans had quite possibly their best match of the night despite falling 2-0 to the Wildcats.
Led by Corrinne Stringer’s 10 kills for the match, Hayden used its size and power to attack at will. However, the Spartans were in both games until late.
Emporia actually led 15-13 in Game 1 due in part to three kills and a service ace from Chalupa. But the Spartans folded, as Hayden went on a 12-0 run to close out the game.
In Game 2, the Spartan trailed by just three points at 11-8, but Stringer, listed at 5-foot-11, went on a scoring barrage with five kills, a block and two service aces to give the Wildcats the 25-13 victory.
“We tired to get our right side to block (Stringer), but she was just slamming it down,” Chalupa said. “I think we played pretty well against them. We played our best volleyball against Hayden.”
The match with Shawnee Heights followed Emporia’s senior night ceremony, and the Spartans looked out of it from the start.
Shawnee Heights jumped out to a 5-0 lead and never let up, recording 12 kills to Emporia’s three, to take Game 1, 25-10.
“It was pretty bad; we were all pretty dead during that game,” Schelling said. “Coach Bloomquist picked up her intensity, and that made us pick up our intensity, and we went out there in Game 2 and went after it.”
After Bloomquist’s fiery episode in between games, the Spartans drastically picked up their play, but to no avail. Shawnee Heights hitters Stefine Pease, Kelsey Hall and Caitlin Conley had three kills each to go with five service aces in Game 2 to turn back a late Emporia charge that saw the Spartans use a 5-1 run to pull to within four points at 23-19.
Chalupa led the Spartans on the night with 13 kills and six service aces in three matches.
Bloomquist said Chalupa was able to find some success thanks to her unorthodox hitting style.
“She hit the ball hard for us and kept it in play,” Bloomquist said. “I think the deceptive nature of her swing — it’s got a little top-spin to it — kind of threw some of the defenders off. She did a nice job of stepping in for Jessica Decker tonight, who went down with an ankle injury (Monday) night.”
The Spartans will take a week off before their next action, which will be next Tuesday when they travel to Highland Park.