SPRING GARDEN – Every team’s definition of success is different than the next. For some, the standards range from a winning record to an area championship.
But the standard of success established by the Spring Garden volleyball team has been reaching the Final Four.
The past two seasons, the Lady Panthers have done just that, but they’ve fallen short of playing for state titles.
“We feel like we’re right there,” head coach Ricky Austin said. “That’s up to me to figure out, what can get us right there.”
The Lady Panthers were “right there” with defending Class 2A state champion Addison in last year’s state semifinals. Even though they were swept in the match, it’s not like the Lady Panthers were blown away. The scores were 25-17, 25-17, 25-19.
“I do think it gives us confidence. It gives us motivation to want more,” Austin said. “This is a good group of seniors for us. We would at least like to get back to that point. We want more obviously, but that is kind of the standard we want to try and get past.”
With six seniors on this season’s squad, Spring Garden has the potential to do just that.
Alle Jennings returns as an outside hitter. Versatile Neely Welsh makes the move from the right side and setting positions to middle hitter. Suzie Carter will join Welsh in the middle. Abbey Steward returns as the Lady Panther setter. Bre Boles and Abbie Woods will patrol the back row.
“Alle has been on the floor for us a lot,” Austin said. “She’s had a great offseason. She’s really gotten stronger and is hitting the ball really well. She has a lot of energy about her.
“Neely’s played every position for us. She’s just that kind of athlete. She’s got quick hands around the net. She plays the net really, really well.
“Suzie is our other middle. She’s gradually gotten a little better every year. She’s made a big improvement, very aggressive around the net. She’s been our consistent strength on the net all preseason. I’m very proud of what she’s able to do from her improvement standpoint.
“I don’t know of anybody who’s got better hands than Abbey. She anticipates. She reads defenses. She puts balls up. If the ball gets in her hands, we’re going to get to swing at it. Her success (rate) of touches to hitters has turned out really good.
“Bre Boles and Abbie Woods are our other two seniors who are going to be on the floor. It’s taken a while for it to be totally their turn, their watch, but they’re ready. I think Bre has had an excellent year. She’s really covering the floor really well for us right now.”
The other Lady Panthers in the varsity rotation are newcomers: Junior Timi Scogin, sophomores Aubrey Sadler and Tatum Page, and freshman Ace Austin.
The younger Austin was pulled up from junior high and will start opposite of Jennings as an outside hitter.
“We needed another outside hitter,” Coach Austin said. “Before school got out, we had tryouts, and that was my whole objective. I had everything else I thought fell into place, but I thought ‘Who’s going to be the next best outside hitter? We’ve got to have one.’ We went to the JV and there just wasn’t anybody strong enough there to get it done.
“Ace is a work in progress. She’s athletic enough to get it done, but we still haven’t played at the speed of a varsity volleyball game yet.”
The Lady Panthers get their first test of the season Aug. 19 at home against Class 4A White Plains. Two days later on Aug. 21, Spring Garden has a quad match at Pleasant Valley with Oxford and Donoho.
“We’ve tried to beef up our tournaments a little bit. We’re trying to find where the semifinal teams, the state tournament teams are playing. That’s where we’re trying to play,” Coach Austin said.
Another team at the level Spring Garden is trying to play against is in its own area: the Sand Rock Lady Wildcats. The two teams played six times last season. Sand Rock won their last meeting in the Class 2A, Area 12 championship match at Spring Garden with a 25-17, 25-13, 22-25, 25-21 victory.
“That’s probably the most humiliating whipping that I’ve had in the last three years in volleyball,” Coach Austin said of the area championship match. “They were so far ahead of us in the area championship match. We referenced that game the rest of volleyball season, and we even referenced that game during basketball season. We referenced that game when these girls started playing softball on what they did to us. It stung us then and it still stings us. We hope we’ve absorbed what we need to absorb off of it. Hopefully we can do something about it, but they’re really good.
“You can’t be a state championship team at the beginning of the year. We’ve got to grow. We’ve got to work. We’ve got to stay excited. We’ve got to stay hungry. I don’t know of a reason why any of that should not happen. Hungry is the key to me. We’ve got a lot of seniors. A lot of times seniors do become complacent when they’ve been around it for so long, but this group has some really good leaders who I think can stomp that out and not let that happen, along with a little coaching influence here and there. Grit and toughness has got to be there all year long for us to improve.”
