Fall 2018; the last time Oak Park had a winning record for women's volleyball was in the fall of 2018. The last time the girls had more than 8 wins in a year was the fall of 2018. Seven years of downhill performances have led them to their best year yet since the COVID-19 pandemic, with a real chance to get that winning record when they face the Indians of St. Joe Central tomorrow night.
Coming out of their Tonka game to bring them to 4-5, the Liberty Blue Jays traveled to Oak Park to face the Oakies for the second time this season, after winning 3-0 the first time. If you were at this game, you probably would've forgotten about it by now. The game was like watching an 8U football team face the Kansas City Chiefs—bad. Losing the first set 13-25, then the second 11-25. Then something happened to the girls, and no, this isn't a Disney movie where they came back and won the game. They lost the third 23-25, showing that this ragtag team of players might be better than we thought.
After becoming 4-6 on the year after that tough game against Liberty, the girls traveled to Northtown to face the Hornets. If you've gone to Oak Park for a week or all four years, you learn pretty fast that we have a saying at this school: "If it flies, it dies." Now you might wonder why we say this as an outsider to the school. Every school in the NKC Schools district, excluding the Northmen, has a mascot that flies: Griffin, Falcon, and Hornet. That's what makes these games so intense and great to watch. Every school in the district is out for each other, and that's what made this 3-0 schooling so great to watch. The Oakies stepped on the gas early and didn't give up, bringing them to a 5-6 record after dominating the Hornets.
Chasing down that 6-6 record, the Oakies traveled 30 minutes south of Oak Park to face the Ruskin Eagles. This game proved that the girls can be, and are, as dominant as we hoped near the beginning of the year. Winning 3-0, Ruskin was not able to score more than 6 points in each set. Getting back to a .500 record and chasing down that winning record.
After an intense 3 games, the Lady Oakies volleyball team is staring down a winning record. With one more game this week against an easy opponent, St. Joe Central, tomorrow night, the girls aim to end the week with a 7-6 record and good momentum heading into the last games of the regular season, with the goal of performing well in the playoffs.
