Boys Volleyball: Gahanna Lincoln Lions learning to play with energy
Holding a 2-0 lead but down 15-9 in the third set against visiting Westerville Central on April 28, the Gahanna Lincoln boys volleyball team came charging back.
The grit that the Lions showed while rallying to win the set and complete a 25-22, 25-15, 25-20 victory over their OCC-Ohio Division rival was an example of the growth they’ve displayed since losing four of their first five matches.
Gahanna is optimistic that more of those moments are still to come during the Division I East Region tournament and into next season with one junior, one sophomore and two freshmen filling key roles.
The tournament drawing was May 15 and the postseason begins May 20.
“At the beginning of the season, it would have been easy for us to get bogged down and into a hole and not bring ourselves up out of it,” senior Jordan Mason said. “We’ve done a better job of keeping our heads up and seeing that just because we were down, that doesn’t mean the set is over.”
Gahanna was 10-12 overall after losing to Westerville North 25-21, 23-25, 25-13, 25-21 on May 11 and finished 10-4 in the league.
“We started off as a young team and lost a lot of seniors, so we’re rebuilding and getting back in the groove and finding our way,” senior A’me Baccus said. “Last year I was a young person on this team, and this year I have to be a leader as a captain and step up and encourage the other people that might be less experienced. We need to keep going in the same direction and keep growing.”
Baccus, who is a middle hitter, and Mason, who has split time between right-side hitter and outside hitter, have been among the team leaders and most experienced players along with senior outside hitter J.J. Vandemark.
Rounding out the senior class is outside hitter T.J. States.
“What we’ve been getting better at is keeping our energy up,” Mason said. “Unfortunately, it did take us a little while, but now that we saw we’re actually able to figure that out and execute the way we want to and control our side of the court, it’s all up from here and we’ve been doing really well.”
After going 19-4 and reaching a regional semifinal last season, the Lions have a new coaching staff led by 2014 Gahanna graduate Katy Noel, with former Pickerington North junior varsity coach Scott Rogers as an assistant.
“They’ve definitely been improving for sure,” Noel said. “We’ve actually been working on mental toughness a lot lately. That’s something they’ve been struggling with early in the season, playing those tight games against competitive teams and being right there back and forth and making a couple errors in a row and not getting down on themselves. That’s something that coach Scott, my assistant, and I have been harping on and making sure they’re working on. I think they’ve realized they have the talent to do well and it’s their mental game that’s holding them back.”
Junior Caleb Boggs and sophomore Lucas Dematos have split time at setter, with Boggs also seeing time at right-side hitter.
Freshman Colin Hetterscheidt has the potential to be a contributor offensively but has filled an important role at libero, according to Noel.
Freshman Nate Boggs has been another key offensive player, splitting time between right-side hitter and outside hitter.
“(We’ve focused on) just being disciplined,” Noel said. “We struggled early with serve-receive and passing and being able to run our offense out of that, so we’ve just continued to see them gain that confidence and make sure we’ve been running our offense on our side of the floor.
“We definitely can kind of get in these ruts sometimes where they’re a little quiet on the court and not communicating, and sometimes that filters into our play because our setters aren’t talking, our passers aren’t talking, our hitters aren’t talking, so we’ve stressed having the energy stem from that for sure.”
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This article originally appeared on ThisWeek: Boys Volleyball: Gahanna Lincoln learning to play with energy
