By Beth Coyle and Maddie DesNoyer Both ‘16 | Staff Writers

The varsity volleyball team finished its season last Thursday night with a record of 10-6.

Last year, the team lost a lot of seniors, a majority of their starting lineup, so the team was very young Lexi Kohut ‘17 said.

“It took us a while to get in the groove of things with so many new and young players. We didn’t have as much talent as we did last year, but we worked past that and grew as a team,” Kohut said.

Captain Kayli Johnson ‘16 said the team had a similar sense of humor and were pretty close so making light of a tough situation was easy.

“There is never any tension with any of the players which is somewhat uncommon with so many girls spending everyday together. This helped with our play because it built chemistry on the court and made it easier with communication and because of that we played a lot better,” Kohut said.

Kohut also said she finds it easy for the team to accept new players and make them feel part of the volleyball family. This year the team pulled up a few girls from the JV team, and they seemed to fit right into the mix, making transitions very easy, Kohut said.

South fell to Livonia Churchill Thursday night in the regional championship game,

“We wanted to make it past the quarterfinals like last year and become a final four/state champion team. We lost in the regional final game, but we did come a long way from where we started,“ Johnson said.

Kohut said for next year the team needs to work on its defensive skills. The team sometimes struggles on the serve receive which is a big factor to the game, she said.

“If we can’t lock down a pass, we won’t be able to get a swing on the ball,” Kohut said. “I think we could do some off-court training to build up speed, agility and core strength. This will not only make us a more talented team but a more disciplined one as well.”

Johnson said her favorite memories of South volleyball are the crowds that would get into the games and running out of the tunnel onto the court.

She added that a drawback to the end of the season is she will miss all the girls and seeing them every day after school.