ORU Early Bird Tournament Top Teams and Players

<p>The club volleyball season has officially arrived. The stressful part of trying out for different clubs and selecting which one fits each athlete the best is finally over and the fun part can begin. Practicing with their new teams and coaches, having fun team bonding activities, and competing at tournaments is finally here! </p> <p>Each year, the club season is kicked off by the ORU Early Bird tournament held in Tulsa. This year’s tournament had a solid array of teams, with 16/17 division teams like Charge 17UA, THR33 17-1, TPV 17-1, Blaze, and OK Redline 17-1 in attendance, while the 14/15 division had teams like THR33 14-1, OK Storm 15-1, Virago 15-1 and TPV 14-1. </p> <p>The 14s and 15s age divisions were combined a<span style="font-size: 1rem;">nd played on Saturday. Rise 15-1 was the #1 seed overall, followed by THR33 14-1 (Delta Region) , TPV 14-1, Virago 15-1, Club Velocity U14-1 (Delta Region), and TPV 14-2. The seedings held pretty close to true, except OK Storm 15-1 as the 7th seed, who was able to make it all the way to the gold division championship. </span></p> <p>The gold division teams were matched up after pool play as follows: Rise 15-1 and THR33 14-1, both receiving a bye in the first round after winning pools A and B. TPV 14-1 played OK Storm 15-1 and Virago 15-1 played Club Velocity U14-1 in the first round. Both Virago 15-1 led by head coach Derek Jackson and OK Storm 15-1 led by head coach Holly Ditmore won 2-0 in the first round to move onto the semis. Virago was matched <span style="font-size: 1rem;">up with Rise 15-1 and OK Storm against THR33 14-1. Rise 15-1 and OK Storm 15-1 both got the win to move onto the gold championship, where we got to see a solid match up. Rise won the opening set 25-20, followed by OK Storm 15-1 evening up the match one set apiece, forcing a 3rd set. Rise took control early in the 3rd set and didn’t look back </span><span style="font-size: 1rem;">with a convincing 15-7 3rd set win, taking home the gold championship title.</span></p> <p>There were not any consolation games, so the finish of teams was:</p> <p>1st- Rise 15-1 (Gold Champions)</p> <p>2nd- OK Storm 15-1</p> <p>3rd- Virago 15-1 <img class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-168891" src="https://prephoops-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/pd/uploads/2021/12/image_6483441-crop-495x325-1638818584-300x197.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="197" /></p> <p>3rd- THR33 14-1</p> <p>5th- TPV 14-1</p> <p>5th- Club Velocity U14-1</p> <p>7th- TPV 14-2 (They finished 4th in pool A but was able to get on track to win out in the silver bracket)</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>The 16s division only had 5 teams. Charge 16-1 South led by head coach Cait Briggs brought home the ORU Early Bird championship. The teams they finished above were BGCOKC 16U, Muskogee 16-1, Momentum 16-1 (Heart of America Region), and THR33 15-1 (Delta Region). </p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>The 17s division had some strong teams in attendance. The overall top one and two seeds were: OK Charge 17UA, THR33 17-1, OK Blaze, and TPV 17-1. Like the 14/15 division, the seeds held close to true. The championship match between OK Charge 17UA and TPV 17-1 was a heavyweight battle of East vs West. I see both teams being strong contenders on their respective sides of the state. Coach James Ward and Charge looked good all of pool play. Players like OH <span style="text-decoration: underline;">[player_tooltip player_id="145990" first="Grace" last="Smallwood"]</span>, S <span style="text-decoration: underline;">Abby Smith</span>, L <span style="text-decoration: underline;">[player_tooltip player_id="145969" first="Haylee" last="Harris"],</span> and OH <span style="text-decoration: underline;">[player_tooltip player_id="145993" first="Sara" last="Freeman"]</span> all played at a high level and were impressive to watch. They have a really solid and balanced team both in the front and back row. Charge 17UA can play with quite a bit of tempo in their offense. They were hard to defend against when they were in system and they brought a balanced attack all across the net. TPV 17-1, led by head coach Nikki Cool, looked impressive too. They have quite the assortment of all-conference Tulsa players. Players like S [player_tooltip player_id="145995" first="Raegan" last="Vernon"], MB [player_tooltip player_id="145974" first="Layla" last="Lenex"], MB [player_tooltip player_id="145999" first="Kendall" last="Johnson"], OH Brooke Goen, and RH Logan Hamilton had great high school seasons this past year. TPV has a strong middle presence and has the ability to be smart and consistent with their out of system swings. </p> <p>17s gold bracket order of finish:</p> <p>1st- Charge 17UA (Gold Champions) <img class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-168888" src="https://prephoops-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/pd/uploads/2021/12/image_50762241-crop-2528x1660-1638818430-300x197.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="197" /></p> <p>2nd- TPV 17-1<img class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-168886" style="font-size: 1rem;" src="https://prephoops-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/pd/uploads/2021/12/image_6487327-crop-994x653-1638818326-300x197.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="197" /></p> <p>3rd- OK Blaze</p> <p>3rd- Tamales 16-1 (Heart of America Region)</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>This was a very early tournament for teams and most haven’t had many practices under their belt. They learned a lot about themselves and what they need to work on going forward. Congrats to Rise 15-1 (14/15 Champs), OK Charge 16-1 South (16s Champs) and OK Charge 17UA (17s Champs) on winning their division in the first tournament of the year. We look forward to covering Tulsa Attack and Redlands Rendezvous the first weekend of January.  </p>