No. 1 Mountain Vista Golden Eagles have 鈥榖rought their A-game鈥�
HIGHLANDS RANCH, Colo. (BVM) 鈥� Rankings and results should be taken with a grain of salt during what is a most unusual 2021 spring high school volleyball regular season in Colorado. Because of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and the fact that the high school season is now coinciding with the club season, it鈥檚 not uncommon for a team to be missing key players on any given night.
That was the case on March 30 when the shorthanded defending Class 5A state champion Chaparral Wolverines were dealt their first loss of the shortened season by the Mountain Vista Golden Eagles in a battle of the top-two ranked teams in the state. But that鈥檚 not to discredit what now No.1-ranked Mountain Vista has accomplished through the first 10 regular-season matches. The 10-0 Golden Eagles aren鈥檛 unbeaten by accident.
鈥淲e just have girls who have definitely improved from last year and have brought their 鈥楢鈥� game,鈥� Mountain Vista head coach Doug Schafer said.
That includes senior outside hitter Kelli Ell, who leads the team and the entire Continental League with 100 kills. She also has a team-best 22 service aces and her 55 digs are second-most for the Golden Eagles.
鈥淪he鈥檚 come into her own this year and she鈥檚 improved a lot from last year and she鈥檚 definitely leading our team,鈥� Schafer said. 鈥淪he does a great job of playing all the way around.鈥�
Mountain Vista has also benefited from the return of steady junior setter Grace Holmgren, who鈥檚 racked up all 178 assists for the team this season after sharing the setting duties with Hannah Holmgren last season when the Golden Eagles placed fifth at state. Another key player back from that squad is junior middle blocker Breklyn Pulling, an all-state honorable mention last year who leads the team with 31 blocks and has the second-most kills with 90.
鈥淪he鈥檚 been doing it since her freshman year,鈥� Schafer said of Pulling. 鈥淪he鈥檚 always just been amazingly consistent and just gets the job done game in and game out.鈥�
Mountain Vista has gotten the job done as a team routinely this season, dropping only one of the 25 sets it has played so far. The hope is that consistency will keep up as the team closes out its abbreviated regular season and heads into the playoffs. Mountain Vista will likely earn a top seed for the state tournament, which will be held next month, but for a program that has never won a state championship, there is more of a wait-and-see approach when it comes to defining postseason expectations.
鈥淭he (No. 1) ranking doesn鈥檛 matter but it鈥檒l help us as we go into the playoffs and then see how it goes from there,鈥� Schafer said. 鈥淚 think once it gets to the playoffs, everybody鈥檚 back to even. 鈥� A lot has to go your way to win state. Like I told the girls, we don鈥檛 need to worry about numbers, and where everything lies right now, I just think we just have to concentrate on winning the next game and focusing on each game as we go.鈥�.
