Lincoln East Varsity Volleyball challenged Columbus and Lincoln North Star in a triangular game on Tuesday, September 7th at East High School. The Spartans won against Columbus 2-1 and North Star 2-0.

These three games were conducted uniquely. Instead of playing the standard best of 5 sets, they played best of 3.

East’s first game of the night was versus Columbus High School. Returning players, Aaliyah Bradford, Brooklyn Fuchs, Brynn Carey, Kamryn Snyder, Meagan Waters, Shandy Faalii and freshman Zoe Radmacher started out the game. An instant kill seconds after the game started set the scene for the rest of the set as theSpartans win the first set.

As the Columbus Discoverers and East Spartans start the second set, Columbus starts to pick up points. After many timeouts and reconfiguration, Columbus wins the second set, causing the game to go into a third set. “It felt as if we were almost playing individually and not as a team,” sophomore outside hitter Meagan Waters said. “We noticed that in the third set and were able to turn that around.”

East springs back quickly keeping Spartan and Discoverers fans on their toes, as senior right side hitter, Kamryn Snyder, goes in for a kill creating an eruption in the stands. After that it was kill after kill, point after point for the Spartans. They won the third set with Columbus trailing behind 16 points.

After losing that second set against Columbus, that was the last thing they wanted to do in the North Star game. “My plan is to make sure they stay consistent with what they’re doing with their serving and their attacking.” Varsity Volleyball Coach Johnson said. And staying consistent is what the Spartans did.
North Star walked away with a win against Columbus but wasn’t prepared for the Spartans. The girls must have felt the energy as they scored the first point of the match. North Star answered quickly, taking an early lead. The Spartans stayed calm and stuck to their plan. Sophomore Shandy Faalii scored two major back to back kills. When North Star called their second timeout the score was 22-18, Spartans. Following the timeout, the Spartans came out on top and ended the first set with a win, as the match point was scored by team captain, Megan Waters.

In the beginning of the second set, back to back kills by senior Kamryn Snyder and sophomore Megan Waters had Spartan nation excited. There was a lot of communication across the court, something that is a tell tale sign of a strong team. Libero, Brynn Carey, played a huge role in controlling the back row as typically a libero handles the defensive side of the game. The Spartans executed their game plan, winning the match 25-18 with a match point scored by Brooklyn Fuchs.

The Spartans share a tight team bond.This allows them to have big goals such as “going to state.” as said by Kaylee Denker. They motivate each other by “honestly just doing as much as you can, like positive words,” Denker said, “You could see in the middle of our sets that we kinda like to joke and dance around a little bit just to make sure that our energy stays up and we stay positive.”

The Spartans plan to play Lincoln Northeast on September 14th at Northeast High School.