Varsity Volleyball: Middletown Attempts Turnaround at Mason-Dixon Invitational

By Ben Spector
Winning After MidKnight

                         

The Middletown High School Knights Varsity Volleyball team lost to the Urbana High School Hawks on Thursday September 8^th and, frankly for the Knights, it was a match they would like to forget as Urbana dispatched the Knights with ease in three straight sets.

Luckily, for the Knights they will have the ability to make a quick turnaround when they compete in the Mason-Dixon Invitational at Westminster High School on Saturday September 10^th with a chance to go up against some tough competition from out-of-state and get a feel for a high paced tournament atmosphere.

This is the first time since 2013 that the Knights have played in an early season tournament as this was added to the Knights’ schedule because Middletown head coach Jamie Pryor saw the benefit in Middletown getting outside the county and conference and getting to play some tougher competition.

Middletown will enter the tournament in Pool C of the tournament as they have been grouped up with the Damascus High School Hornets, the Atholton High School Raiders, and the Huntingtown High School Hurricanes.

Each team in Pool C with the Knights will provide a challenge as Damascus has always been a dark horse in the 3A West region, while Atholton is one of the top teams in Howard County, with Huntingtown closing out the group as one of the premier volleyball programs in the state of Maryland.

The other pools face tough talent as well as Pool A is made up of the Carlisle High School Bison, the Waynesboro Area High School Indians, the South River High School Seahawks, and the host the Westminster High School Owls.

The final pool is Pool B which contains the Cedar Cliff High School Colts out of Camp Hill, Pennsylvania, the Winters Mill High School Falcons, the Northern High School Patriots, and the Sherwood High School Warriors.

Middletown will need to play strong if they want to come out on top of the tournament as not only are they going up against difficult opponents but are going up against rule changes that differ from the usual National Federation of High School Sports (NFHS) rules.

In the normal NFHS rules, the games are played to five sets so the team who wins three first wins the match. The difference between a normal game and this tournament is that these matches will be only three sets with the first to two picking up the win, because of the time constraints of playing a twelve team tournament in just a day.

This means that all the teams will have to change up the strategy for this tournament a slight bit as if it takes any team a while to heat up they could be looking at a one set deficit which would mean they would have to win the next two sets straight up.

The other key for Middletown will be to win in straight sets as points are being awarded for sets won as well as matches won which means that it is imperative for the Knights to do as much winning as they can overall as only the first place teams in each group plus the top ranked second place teams will make it through to the finals.

Middletown will be in a low pressure environment as it isn’t make or break if the Knights win this. That low pressure environment may be the best spot for them as they look to make up for past performances.