The Girl’s team went into tonight as the underdogs. Facing River Bluff, the number 1 seed in the state, our girls were ranked fourth. Add to it the fact that River Bluff had already beaten us twice this year and it’s easy to see why Mauldin was not the favorite.

On the River Bluff athletic’s page, they posted a short story about it today:

River Bluff hopes to continue their playoff drive tonight as they travel to Mauldin for a matchup between two number 1 seeds. While the two programs are quite similar, River Bluff won both of the matches between the two programs earlier in the season in close 2-set sweeps.

River Bluff Athletics

They even included stats about the previous games, and even though the first chart of team-scoring averages seemed to favor Mauldin, they still had beaten us in both meetings, by the same scores, in fact.

My thought was that we had to win that first set. That seemed like a non-negotiable. Early on we were up by four or more, but then River Bluff came back. It went back and forth until Mauldin broke free and won 25-22.

“River Bluff will be out for blood now,” I thought, and they were indeed. They led most of the second set, and when it was 18-22, I thought we might not be able to recover. But we did, taking the second set 27-25.

“The River Bluff girls are broken now,” I told K. I didn’t mean that they were going to fall apart but simply that while they could have brushed off a first-set loss, a second-set loss would sting all the more. I thought one thing would be running through the River Bluff girls’ heads: had this been a best-of-three set game like in most tournaments, it would have been over.

The third set was close, but in the end, our girls swept them with a 25-23 win in the final set. The reaction was amazing, first from the girls, then from the students watching:

The River Bluff girls were heartbroken, with several of them just in tears. “I saw,” L said, “it was kind of sad.” That’s just the nature of sports, though. Someone has to win; someone has to lose. And after our rough club season earlier this year, I am so glad to see our Girl winning like this.

A couple of L’s friends from another high school — the high school we’d beaten to be regional champions — came to cheer Mauldin on. The three of them played club together this year, and they’re happy for L as well.

“That’s the number one team in the state!” I said to one of the girls. Her expression grew serious as she clarified, “Not anymore.”

Indeed.

Next up — Dorman. Last year, they beat Mauldin in the quarter-finals. Time for some revenge…