A four-year force: Part 2 — Sophomore Spartans come close to perfection

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 13/05/2021 (1789 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The defending provincial AAAA junior varsity champion Neelin Spartans returned for the 2011 high school volleyball season ready to rock. This one would look much different than their shocking title run on home court the one prior. Since the majority of the group was back, including the full starting rotation, teams expected a battle every time they took the court.

Jamie Campbell: “Definitely some more expectations and people knew the level we were at. We didn’t really go into any tournaments as the underdog. We weren’t on top either at the beginning … but we definitely proved ourselves.”

Paige Thomson: “After Grade 9, no one had really heard of us either because we didn’t go to any tournaments. Once we won we were on the radar of all these teams. Grade 10 we came out guns blazing.”

Amy Gordon: “Coming from Brandon, a lot of the Winnipeg teams didn’t think the Brandon teams would compete every year … Once we went in and won that first year, people knew who we were, knew the Spartans were a team that was going to come and compete, and actually put up a good fight.”

Jordan Hardy: “We felt we still had stuff to prove because we didn’t play a lot of games in Grade 9. We knew we had to keep working hard if we wanted to be successful so we kept doing that.”

Nicole Tuininga (nee Clemons): “Especially with them having just come second at nationals that year, there was definitely a big target on their back but all the more reason to keep training.

“You could feel the shift when teams played the Spartan girls because everybody wanted the opportunity to beat them.”

Jael Unger: “I would say we knew we had a target on our back and we knew people wanted to beat us. We were ready to take on the challenge. We didn’t really focus on what other teams thought of us or who else we were competing against. We prepared well for certain players or certain teams but we didn’t really focus on other people’s opinions.”

The Spartans got on a roll and didn’t stop all season. They piled up win after win, and went far beyond provincial borders to do so. Neelin made its name known in Nova Scotia as it went in to the Dalhousie University varsity tournament and won it, undefeated.

Alison Quiring:  “The Halifax trip is by far one of my favourite volleyball memories of all-time. That was so much fun.”

Jael Unger: “It was a varsity tournament there and we were all Grade 10 junior varsity players. We ended up winning that tournament actually. We knew how well we could play and take care of the ball on our side of the net but we didn’t realize we could walk into a varsity tournament and compete.”

Kevin Neufeld: “(It) was a bit of a wakeup for Nova Scotia varsity volleyball.”

Jamie Campbell: “Going across the country and playing teams we’d never heard of or seen play and to come out on top, that was definitely a memorable trip.”

Alexis Jameson: “That was a great trip and I still have so many memories from it. That was awesome. It was actually my first airplane ride, along with some of the other girls on the team.”

Alison Quiring: “At that point we hadn’t really travelled very much with volleyball. In the years following it became such a regular thing … but this was our first big trip, going without parents, going with your best friends. Our principal Mr. Damsky came along and he ended up being such a good time and we felt like the insiders because Neuf was really good friends with Rick Scott, the head of Dalhousie. I think we went for Thanksgiving dinner at his parents’ house actually. We just felt a bit VIP, winning all our games and getting to experience a new part of Canada was so cool.” 

One of the biggest reasons for the team’s success was its dominance in the middle. Paige Thomson and Alison Quiring were named provincial all-stars in 2010 and only got better as the years went on.

Kristine Ward: “It made my life way easier because I knew the blockers on the other side of the net actually had to commit to them.

“If your middles aren’t as respected you don’t get those kind of seams. It makes our job way easier. I’m thankful we had, I would say, the top middles in the province.”

Kevin Neufeld: “(Quiring) was the number three player in Manitoba (in Grade 11 and 12). Allison could control the game and our serving was still dominate as well. She was a tremendous server.”

Paige Thomson: “My partner in crime. Ali is my second half. We’d always joke around that we were the twin sticks because we were just long and lanky. It was always so fun to play with Ali because she always had an up beat about her, she was always happy.”

Kristine Ward: “One of the strongest-willed on our team for sure. Neuf used to make fun of her serve because she’d do this wonky serve where she’d come from outside the court and do this big run into the court. He’d give her so much crap for it but she’d give it right back to him.”

Jael Unger: “Alison was able to do many different things well, as well as volleyball. She was always well-spoken and ready to get the job done.”

Jamie Campbell: “Alison was so much fun to play with. She was always there for a good laugh but she meant business when she had to. She was a big impact up front and had a really great season.”

Amy Gordon: “Alison was always super fun-loving, but she was a really good athlete. I’d set her the ball, we’d win the game and be able to laugh about whatever two minutes later.”

Nicole Tuininga: “I don’t think there’s anything she doesn’t succeed at. She’s naturally talented and gifted in a lot of ways … She is herself and you like it you like it, you don’t, you don’t. I respect that.”

Kevin Neufeld: “Paige Thomson was a great competitor and could block. She could anticipate and wasn’t touching the basketball rim by any means but she had great anticipation and was a really good blocker.” 

Amy Gordon: “Paige was definitely a super strong force in the middle.”

Jael Unger: “She always brought a light to the volleyball court and was always ready to play.”

Alison Quiring: “Paige was my partner in crime. If I wanted to do something weird, Paige was my person I’d do it with. We became friends so young doing Stars basketball together so Paige has always been in my life.”

Jamie Campbell: “She’s a goofball. Me and Paige always had a special handshake we invented in Grade 10 and it continued to the last game we played together.”

Nicole Tuininga: “She’s a goofball but when it came to sports was she competitive and she did not like to lose.”

Neelin cruised into provincials in Portage as the top seed, went 5-0 in pool play and stomped Westwood 2-0 (25-13, 25-11) to reach the final. Then, a perfect season came to a sudden, screeching halt. The Mennonite Brethren Hawks dished out a 2-0 (25-22, 25-19) blow to take the provincial title and unknowingly start quite the rivalry.

Amy Gordon: “That sucked for sure.”

Kevin Neufeld: “We were in a little tighter space at the Portage Collegiate gym. Our serving was a real important weapon for our team and just weren’t able to and did not serve very well. Losing maybe keeps kids engaged, that we had to keep working harder and keep staying the course the following year. I’m never a big believer that losing teaches you a lot but I think sometimes it does make kids want to stay involved.”

Paige Thomson: “It happened really fast. I remember semis went by, it was good. We were at Portage and it was ‘Was that actually a game? Did that actually happen?’ We didn’t have the spark that game that we had all season. I couldn’t put my finger on, I don’t think there was one specific thing it was. It all went by in a flash.”

Alexis Jameson: “It was kind of a shock to our system maybe.”

Jamie Campbell: “We just took it game by game and didn’t look at the big picture along the way. You go into the finals with that momentum that you haven’t lost a game yet, so that’s when it clicked that we had a pretty good season … definitely to lose that last game was tough.”

Jael Unger: “There were certain things we could have done better … they just outperformed us and we tried our best. It’s not like we didn’t give it our best effort.”

Jordan Hardy: “We all knew we should have won, we could have done it. It’s hard to go that long winning every single game because you’re held to a higher standard and are expected to win, so I think the pressure was really on for us.

“It might have just been the pressure and I know when we made a few mistakes, lots of us kind of got down on ourselves and that was hard.”

Alison Quiring: “I don’t really remember that game. I kind of blocked it out. But at that age it really felt like the world was ending. We worked so hard that season and had so much success and at the time it almost felt like it was for nothing because that provincial title is what gets all the attention, it’s what goes up on walls. That was really devastating and everyone was like ‘We would have given up so much of our success this season just for this one game.’ That was really hard and our first big loss of a game that mattered significantly.

“That was also the year we got second at nationals for club so that was a rough go. We were feeling a bit discouraged after those two big losses.”

Nicole Tuininga: “MBCI, They are very good at volleyball so hats off to them for beating us but to lose that game was absolutely devastating. Not just as a coach but you could see on the girls faces, just how could we lose this one after a perfect season? But that’s sports and good on them for coming back to club wanting to be better.”

 

The Spartans went 47-1, but would have traded a few dozen of those Ws to be a little better that day. They did, however, use it as fuel to get a lot better for tomorrow.

 

Amy Gordon: “In the moment obviously that breaks your heart. You go home crying after the game and are upset for three weeks. It hurts and you don’t really see why that would have happened. Looking back now that was maybe a bittersweet lesson and probably made us better for it, put us in a better position for the start of the Grade 11 year.”

Paige Thomson: “We had a little bit of a chip on our shoulder. I remember people were like ‘Oh, they choked,’ the whole politics of it. But it did push us in the right direction to be like ‘OK, that sucked. Do we want to let that happen again? No.’ So we just put nose to the wall and worked that much harder going into our Grade 11 year.

“Knowing everybody was like ‘They’re the team to beat’ and we lost and it’s, ‘Well, are they the team to beat?’ We had that in the back of our head that it was a little bit embarrassing but I never saw it that way.”

Jordan Hardy: “I think it was kind of good that we lost because we realized we can’t take it easy on the training, only because we’re winning doesn’t mean we have to stop working hard. There’s always room for improvement.”

Jael Unger: “We each had a bit of a chip on our shoulder and a sting of what had just taken place. We still had to compete against those girls on their various club teams. We just had to pick ourselves back up, keep training hard and hope for a better outcome the next season. We were never a team that got stuck in a negative or reminisced on a bad outcome. We just put that to the side and kept going.”

Nicole Tuininga: “It’s a good learning experience in life to learn how to lose and how to come back from that. This was good for those girls for sure.”

Paige Thomson: “I think it was a very good learning experience for us. I think when we did get to the final we did have a sense of ‘All right, we haven’t lost yet.’ That season we didn’t have as much adversity compared to our Grade 11 and Grade 12 seasons. Losing provincials that year carried us over to our goal of winning a AAAA varsity title in the back of our heads since we did lose the JV one. We didn’t want to let that happen again.”

 

TOMORROW: Grade 11 season begins

 

» tfriesen@brandonsun.com

» Twitter: @thomasmfriesen