By Jeremy McDonald
Jeremymcdonald73@gmail.com
FALLS CITY, Ore.– Janice Craig was just in a groove Thursday night serving for the Chemawa Volleyball team.
The senior, from the Yakima Nation Tribe in Washington, helped the Lady Braves jump out to an 8-0 lead in the second set, 12-0 lead in the third set and a 4-0 start in the fourth set of Chemawa’s 22-25, 25-13, 25-12, 25-16 1A Casco League victory over Falls City on the road.
Each serve that Craig took, there was some pressure. Sometimes, she’ll face the wall behind her for a moment, have some positive self-talk, take a deep breath, and then turn around to serve.
“I think the one thing that kept me focused was praying to The Creator and praying for the best to help me get that serve over the net,” said Craig. “My coach has us do a lot of breathing techniques to calm us down since we’re in a different area. It’s not our home court. So he gave us a lot of breathing exercises, which allowed me to focus up. I also want to thank all of our JV players for coming out supporting us. It was really nice.”
Those serves challenged the young Mountaineers to adjust with their serve-receive. With four freshmen on their roster this Fall coming off of a 1A State Playoff appearance last Fall, it’s been a slow growth for the squad. Their first set victory over the Braves was just their second set victory of the season, and Head Coach Tiauannah Labrado pointed towards their mental and physical focus out of the gate before Chemawa turned to their serving game over the course of the final three sets.
“It was a lot on the girls honestly. They were bringing their mental and physical game,” starts Labrado. “Our skills are improving tredemously, and we’re excited to see where the season goes with how much they’ve improved.”
“We’ve been working on it a lot in practice, we got a lot of new girls who’ve never played before, so getting those hard serves is a lot for them. So, just continuing to practice that and getting better at that,” Labrado adds about their serve-receive.
Falls City will look to get into the win column Tuesday when they travel to play Jewell in another Casco League game.
For Chemawa, they’ll have a big test on Monday when they travel to Brooks to play Willamette Valley Christian and St. Paul in a Casco League Tri-Dual. At 2-1, the Braves are in rarified air in terms of their program. This is the third time since 2018 that they’ve won two games in a Varsity season. Just two games in 2018, and two more in 2022.
Between 2013 and 2017, they had only won once. Total.
Seven wins since 2013, and they have a chance to make a run at the postseason for the first time for any Braves program since the 1982 Boys Basketball program made the postseason over 40-years ago.
“They’re just really coachable. They’re really teachable. They show up to the gym, working hard every day. But it’s also great to be in a league where we can compete. Falls City, Perrydale, Willamette Valley Christian. These are all teams that we match up well with, and it’s fun to see competitive games,” said Chemawa Head Coach Ty Robison. (Monday) will be a test for sure to see where we measure up for sure in league with those games, I’ll like to see us play well (Thursday) was just our third match.
“I think September 6th was our first official practice, so we’ve been playing for a couple of weeks. I’m really proud of the progress and we’ll get better, I really like the group that I have currently.”
Photos By Jeremy McDonald
