VA Elite 18s Finish 3rd Overall at USAV Nationals
April 29, 2024 Author: Webmaster
The 2023-2024 season marked the first season that Virginia Elite played in CHRVA Bid regionals since the 2011-2012 campaign. Prior to Virginia Elite’s hiatus from regional bid play, the club had earned more than 20 regional championships and over 30 bids to USAV Nationals in a short 8 years. During the break from regional play, Virginia Elite had opted to play in Open qualifiers to earn the opportunity to go to Nationals. The last bid earned was an 18 Open bid at NorthEast Qualifier in March 2020, just one week prior to the COVID shutdown.
After earning a bid in CHRVA regionals, the VA Elite 18s team began their Nationals quest on April 26th! The USAV Nationals divisions are a juried field and all teams had earned the opportunity to compete in their respective divisions. The team came in the 28th seed and seeded 2nd in their pool on day 1. The first two matches of the day were challenging but VA Elite 18s were in control and cruised to straight set victories. The third match against a talented Maverick 18 Elite would go to 3 sets with VA Elite losing 12-15 in the third. Maverick 18 Elite would go on to tie VA Elite 18s for a 3rd overall finish. The team finished 2nd in the day 1 pool and would move to the top half of the tournament as they continued their quest for gold!
Day 2 would only get more difficult as Virginia Elite faced a physical Colorado Juniors, VC Nebraska and Forza 1. Virginia Elite would control both the Colorado Juniors and Forza 1 matches, winning in straight sets but VC Nebraska was a battle against well balanced teams. Ultimately, VA Elite would win 15-12 in the third set to take 1st and go undefeated in the day 2 pool play. The top 2 teams from the top half pools were then put into evening challenge matches. After a bit of a break and refueling, the VA Elite 18s were back on the court challenging for gold against Team LVC. The opening set of the challenge match was a back and forth battle with VA Elite dropping the set 22-25. A refocus on dictating terms from the serve line and a bit of a match-up change saw VA Elite battle to an early lead and never look back, taking the set 25-20 and forcing a decisive set 3. Set 3 began with a back and forth battle until Libero, Elle Jubeck went to the service line and rattled off 7 aces to put the team up 13-6. The team would side out to take a 14-6 lead and Claire finished off the match on a service ace to send the team to the Gold bracket on day 3!
The first match of the gold bracket was against a talented and physical Alabama Performance who knocked out Triangle Blue in the challenge rounds. Set one proved to be a battle with Elite coming out on top 27-25. The second set, Elite did what they like to do and dictated terms from the serve line to cruise to a 25-14 victory and move to the semi-final match vs. Aspire 18 Black from Arizona. The semi-final match began with a strong first set and a late second set rally but Elite would ultimately drop the match in straight sets to the tournament champions.
VA Elite finished the 3 day quest with a 7-2 record to end 3rd overall. This was the 2nd highest finish by a CHRVA team in any division since 2015.
