Tryouts have ended for the Boys Volleyball team, and the 2018 season has officially begun. As the roster is being finalized, the team has already begun practicing for their meets. Back with several eager new players on the team this year, the team feels confident for the new season.
To senior Kamal Moussa, observing on “how much better our team looks” and the “competition” this year, he feels confident enough to expect the team to succeed to States this year. Junior Ryoma Yonetani also feels the same way, with his expectations being to “win more games than last year” and qualifying for States. For junior Gabriel Madeira, his personal expectations for this season is to “learn more about playing volleyball” and improving his volleyball skills, since he is a newcomer to the team.
The volleyball team has already set goals for themselves. Junior Reda Said, also a newcomer to the team, says that his goal is to “have fun” and for the team to “try [their] best in each game”. For Moussa, a goal set for both the team and himself is to improve on their skills both individually and as a team, while also making sure to work hard to make States. Madeira’s goal for himself is to “understand the game better”, and improve on his own skills. He also aspires for the team to work together to win as much games as they can. Yonetani’s personal goal is to “keep [his] game consistent” throughout the season, and to “bring out the full potential from the hitters”, since Yonetani is a setter, which is essentially a passer for hitters.
Yonetani, a returning member of the team, says that the previous season was “decent”. He says that although even though the team did not win as many games as they were hoping, a positive of last season was that “everybody got to learn more of the game” and “gain more experience”. Moussa, also a returning member, says that “considering the team was about two years old” last year, since Malden High only started a Boys Volleyball team a few years ago, the team was good overall, but had “much room for improvement”, due to not being able to make States. The team hopes to qualify this year.
Although things have started out great so far, there are definitely a set of challenges this year. For Said, one of the team’s challenges is “getting along with the new guys”, and “learning the aspect of volleyball” for newcomers. Yonetani says that a challenge for this season is keeping a “consistent performance”. Moussa believes that a main challenge this year is “beating the hardest teams” on their game schedule, and further improving their own skills and in “every category [they] can” so they can learn to “always be adapting” and to “be on [their] toes at all time[s]”.
For Madeira, one challenge is the team working together to “communicate” and “get used to all the new people”. He says that there are returning players from last season, but the team also has some new players, so the team has to “work towards everyone understanding how to play”. Another challenge is having to work on “the formations” and “where everyone should play” and making sure everybody on the team is “on the same page” and “ready when [they] start having games”.
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