Fingers scrunching the jersey across your back, sweaty foreheads pressed into a circle of loose flyaway hairs with faces showing wide, excited eyes and a flurry of spoken encouragements.
The Arcata High School Volleyball Varsity and Junior Varsity (JV) teams had their first league game against Eureka High School on the night of Thursday, September 19th, 2024.
Both games were close. The first set of the JV game was 19-25, Eureka. The set following was 16-25, Arcata. The third and final set showed an incredibly close game. Arcata was down 7-14 at game point until they triumphed at the ending score 16-14. Freshman and setter Lily Bowman, number two on the court, served the final nine points.
“[JV] just gutted it out there at the end,” teacher at Arcata High and Varsity Coach Laurie Griffith-Renteria said. “That’s really [impressive], especially for JV, to make that many serves in a row…they also had rallies, it wasn’t like she [Lily Bowman] just served six [in a row].”
Varsity lost their first game 18-25, won their second and third games 25-16, lost their fourth game 21-25, and won their final and fifth game 15-10.
“Arcata’s resilience in defense and keeping tempo surprised me,” Arcata High Boys Volleyball Team and student section member senior Elijah Gonzales said. “I was mostly yelling the entire time with the other guys as well as cheering for the team.”
Alongside him was his teammate, junior Arthur Yang, who said the JV game was slower-paced but still intense.
“The [Varsity] game was really long since it was 5 sets and the scores were closer and closer each time,” Yang said. “What was unexpected was that the team kept tipping all the time so when they came to hit it was a hard hit.”
Senior and varsity defensive specialist number 15 Bella Campbell, who had nine aces (serves the other team was unable to receive and play) and 32 digs (receives), said momentum shifts were caused by difficulty passing in serve receive.
“For both games, we played down to their level,” Campbell said. “We are a really good program that has such good teams but we tend to not play at [our] own speed, which is much faster and much better play.”
Griffith-Renteria said Arcata didn’t expect Eureka to hit difficult angles and serve in such a hard spot to receive.
“I was shocked by how scrappy and good Eureka was at getting everything up,” junior and setter Harper Appy, nine on the court, said.
Griffith-Renteria considered potential decisions she could make to change momentum.
“I was just trying to figure out what I could do to make a difference and get us inspired or doing something… That’s what I was just trying to figure out, what we could do to flip that switch because I know we could play a lot better if we did.”
Griffith-Renteria said both of them were a struggle that ended up turning out fine.
“This could be one of those years that… I think anybody could beat anybody because anybody could have a good night,” she said. “We got ourselves back up and did it at the end… I was pleased that we didn’t give up and just kept going.”
Since then, Varsity has faced Del Norte High School and come away with a close loss and won against Fortuna High School. They defeated McKinleyville at Pink Night on Tuesday, October 1st and won against Eureka on Tuesday, October 8th. Most recently, they achieved a staggering victory against Del Norte on the night of October 10th. Energy was high and Arcata played well. “They weren’t on that night and whatever they threw at us we were ready,” Campbell said. “They didn’t do anything fancy than what they did the first time we played them.”
Since then, they’ve won against both Fortuna and McKinleyville. They continue competing in North Coast Sections for the last weeks of October, continuing into November if they do well.
