Sandpoint Volleyball Club falls to tourney's top seed

PHOENIX, Ariz. — The Sandpoint Volleyball Club U18 team played its best match of the season, and had the No. 1 seed Arizona Storm on the ropes, before falling 26-24, 25-22 in the first match of bracket play Thursday at the National Volleyball Tournament in Phoenix.

The No. 7 seed SVBC bounced back to beat Saddleback Valley Volleyball Club in three games, before running out of gas and falling in two games to the New Mexico Juniors, setting up a final match today for ninth place today against 951 Elite, a strong team from Southern California.

SVBC head coach Jack Dyck had high praise for the play of his team against the top seed out of 222 teams. The Storm advanced to the championship match today after the scare from SVBC.

“We gave it a good run, just came up a little short,” said Dyck, whose team led for most of the first game. “We had them on the ropes a couple of times, and I was proud of how the girls competed.”

Dyck called the week-long tournament a ton of fun, and said his team got a look at a high level of volleyball and beat some great teams.

“It was a good prep for the four girls going to college next year, a lot of high level volleyball,” he said, adding his team was gassed in the third match of the day against New Mexico. “That first match took a lot out of us and we kind of ran out of gas at the end of the day.”