Out-of-Focus win

The typically rowdy crowd was silent for most of the Cougars' match with Harrisonburg. The vacuum of sound was doubled by the almost nonexistent Blue Streak crowd. But with witnesses or not, the Cougars remained undefeated on their new court, winning in four games 25-14, 21-25, 25-18, 25-15.

Per the norm, the Cougars came out in dominating fashion in Game 1, easily handling the Streaks. The deep Cougar bench was able to control the net and take advantage of Harrisonburg's short bench.

During the break before Game 2, Harrisonburg coach Valerie Penton made an adjustment to her rotation that proved to be a thorn in the Cougars' paws.

Tori Fornadel caused havoc while she was at the net and blocked a Tabitha Bowman spike for a point, making the score 3-2 in the Streaks' favor and swung the momentum over to Harrisonburg's corner.

"We rotated our rotation," Penton said. "We sent Fornadel up against Bowman on the front row and gave her a few more touches on Bowman's ball."

The Cougars never led in the game but were twice able to knot the score.

"Sometimes we are awesome," laughed Draft coach Kami Meeteer. "When we pay attention to what we are doing, we do really well. It's just hard sometimes to stay in the game every second. It's a focus thing - you win the first game and it was easy so you go into the second game with that idea. Just gotta learn to keep focus all the time."

The win in Game 2 was the only one Harrisonburg could muster, despite a slow Cougar start in the third.

Draft trailed 4-0 after Fornadel landed a kill and snuck in another point, before the full Cougar arsenal reared its head. Kirby Hatter set up Tabitha Bowman for a kill followed by a Kamron Johnson spike. Another kill from Rachel Maki, and the Cougars were back on top, leading 9-8.

"They have a real strong attack from the [Tabitha] Bowman girl, but it's not just her they have depth - nothing hit the floor," Penton said.

Crisp passes and clean kills gave the Cougars an edge that they didn't relinquish for the rest of the match.

Maki was a factor at the start of the fourth game as well when she nailed back-to-back aces to start the showdown. The Streaks would comeback and take a brief 5-4 lead after two Fornadel kills, but that only lit the fire under the Cougar starters.

"Tabitha always does well, but Rachel Maki always shines, Aliya [Stevenson] does really well and so does Kamron [Johnson]. All my hitters do well," Meeteer said. "I do have some strong hitters and it's nice being able to use them when I need to."

Harrisonburg scored 10 points for the rest of the final game.

The Cougars (12-1, 5-0 Southern Valley) will leave their new gym and go on the road for their next three matches, two of which are against Southern Valley foes R.E. Lee (Oct. 11) and Fort Defiance (Oct. 18). Lee has one loss in the Southern Valley this year, coming at the hands of the Cougars on Sept. 13. Fort Defiance lost to Lee and the Cougars this year.

Draft will be in non-district action on Thursday, traveling to Turner Ashby. Game time is at 6 p.m.

The Cougars' JV team dominated the Streaks winning 25-8, 25-8. Erin Brown had 12 service points and eight aces in the win.