Thoughts on Pre season

Firstly, I would like to thank all of the teams involved. I believe it was the most competitive pre season classic in the state. All 4 teams; Berkeley Prep (3A) , Ft.Myers (4A), Venice (5A), Plant (6A) have a legitimate shot to win their classification. I would also like to thank all of you who came out to support the Indians. We had an almost packed gym for the Plant/Venice game for a pre season contest!
Secondly, I believe Pre season is a great time to experiment with new things, play tough competition to see your teams weaknesses, and get a feel for where your team is at in general. We could have easily scheduled easy competition and won outright but we would have a false sense of security of how good our team really is. Its like I told the team yesterday (before I gave them their 1st day off since we began) that we do not have to play the State Championship this week.
We have many things to work on throughout the season but all a coach can really ask of his team is that they care and work hard. We DEFINITELY have that on our 2009 team. It was very obvious how much better we played from Tuesdays game to Thursdays. We cut our unforced errors in half because we were much more disciplined.
I am looking forward to the regular season starting next week. We have a full week. The varsity opens up at Braden River on Tuesday which I think will be one of the most competitve teams in the area and that is why I wanted to play them. Former district foe, Southeast will be at home on Wednesday with an early start of 5:00, and then we will travel to Sarasota Riverview on Thursday. This will be an exciting game for a few reasons. 1) Venice and RHS will renew a rivalry match bc these two teams have not played in quite a few years 2) RHS has one of the most talented players in the area with Bree Scarbrough and 3) This match will be the 1st ever athletic contest in the New Riverview gym so I am sure it will be filled to capacity and we need the Venice supporters and the Wheatley Wackos to show up in their Forest Green apparrel.

EXTRAordinary effort

"Teamwork is the ability to work together toward a common vision. The ability to direct individual accomplishments toward organizational objectives. It is the fuel that allows common people to attain uncommon results."

11-19-09

"Play like you are in 1st place. Prepare like you are in 2nd"

2009 Freshmen and JV Teams

Practice for the freshmen and JV team is wed and Fri from 10am -12. Thurs will be from 3:30 - 6 with a mandatory parent and players meeting @ 6PM in the North Gym.
Also, as usual, there will be another tryout for the freshmen team during the 1st week of school.
We are looking forward to another exciting season of Venice Volleyball!

Congrats to the following:
JV

Hannah Revels
Bianca Echtler
Lauren Neilson
Naomi Skopec
Yazmin Velez
Holly Mattmuler
Heather Parrish
Danica Yoder
Ashley Keith
Danya Cemovich
Taylor Jais
Abby Carlson

Freshmen

Taylor Chase
Emme Zastempowski
Victoria Kaiser
Mandy Warner
Crystal Coluzzi
Elena Erez
Heiley Hanrahan
Kennedy Garcia
Nichole Fortunato

Alumni win streaked snapped!!

The streak is over and the '09 team broke the 4 year win streak in another 5 game marathon with a 2 point win in the end. Current players defeated alumni 30-32,22-25, 25-21, 26-24, 15-13. Player of the game honors go to Danielle Durham, an '05 graduate and former 5A Player of the Year. She starred at Florida Southern the last 4 years. Alumni team was coached by former VHS volleyball assistant for 12 years, Jose Velez.