Odd Night At The Gym

Something I typically do before officiating my youth basketball and volleyball games is check the standings.   I check the standings to get an idea of the possible competitiveness of a game.

For my slate of four youth volleyball games tonight, I did not do this.  However, the gym director did and here's what I found out:

There were four games (5 PM, 6 PM, 7 PM, 8 PM).  The first game was a 4th grade game and followed by a 7th grade game and two 8th grade games.

Out of the eight teams playing, SEVEN of the teams were WINLESS.  The eighth team had only one win.  Keep in mind, this is the around the 4th week of the season so all the teams were definitely struggling a bit.

But with a slate of struggling teams playing each other, odd things were bound to happen.

In the first game, one of the winless teams (Red) swept Blue 25-12, 25-11.   Both teams may have been winless entering the game but the Red teams looked a lot better than Blue.

The last three games also have a strange vibe to them:  The team that won the first set proceeded to LOSE the final two sets.  However, while the three older teams didn't have great records, all of them played hard and the fans were quite engaged.

At the end of the night, three of the seven winless teams got their first victory.  The one win team had to sweep the last two sets to gain their second win of the season.

Despite the weirdness, it was an entertaining night of officiating volleyball.