State Standouts

<!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>Oklahoma volleyball has officially finished for the 2022-23 high school season. We were able to be at almost every state tournament match for all classes. Let's take a look at some players who did a great job for their team. Volleyball is clearly moving forward in a big way!</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p><strong>[player_tooltip player_id='156862' first='Kathrin' last='Rowe']</strong>- She is a setter and right side hitter for Edmond Memorial. She may be undersized for a 6A state champion hitter BUT I promise if you watch for five points, you will see she is amazing! She has some serious bounce and arm power. She unloaded on balls left and right. She also does a fantastic job of tracking balls down when she is setting. She was a huge reason Memorial entered at #1 and exited the same. </p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p><strong>[player_tooltip player_id='212407' first='Livia' last='Ward']</strong>- She is the 5-1 setter for Mount. St. Mary. I will go ahead and say it, she is the best setter in the state! AND she is only a sophomore. Her one-footed sets while out of system are on point. She also is really discipled in her touch point, which makes her very deceptive. She has really good hitters around her but she definitely makes that offense hum. </p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p><strong>[player_tooltip player_id='145990' first='Grace' last='Smallwood']</strong>- She is a six rotation outside hitter for Bishop McGuinness. I am such a huge fan of pins who control the ball when attacking rather than swing for power. Grace can do both! She hit some amazing shots during the run to the championship. To a normal fan, she make look like she gets lucky with some of the kills that go down but if you have a trained eye, you know it is far from the truth. She also contributes from the back row in many forms: serving, digging, and swinging out of the back row. </p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p><strong>[player_tooltip player_id='145961' first='Katie' last='Kolar']-</strong> She is setter and right side hitter for Norman North. She and her teammates fought down to the end. Their heart and fight are some things that teams around the state should try to emulate. Kolar will be playing for West Virginia soon and she will fit in well. She took huge swings when the pressure was high and delivered. She is high enough level to attack a block with confidence and tool it to get points, she is disciplined enough to take big swings even on not ideal sets, and she is humble enough to get kills by means of tips instead of feeling the need to bash every ball. </p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p><strong>[player_tooltip player_id='156869' first='Kynli' last='Kirkendoll']</strong>- She is a right side hitter for Jenks. She is still relatively new to the game but is flourishing quickly. She has such a high contact point that even during the state tournament, she is hitting over the top of blockers. She would run a fast tempo ball to the right side and cut it down the line. This was a super effective attack all tournament long. So much so, that they set her often in really big moments and looked for that exact thing to get them a needed point. That high contact point isn't just for hitting, she presses over the net on opposing outside hitters really well and had multiple monster blocks. </p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p><strong>Gia McGrew</strong>- She is a right side hitter for Mt. St. Mary. She is a transfer from the state of Florida. She was a huge threat with the power she brings in her swings. MSM would run a 31 with middles, which forced teams to choose to commit to the middle on the far left of the court or leave McGrew one-on-one. Neither option was great and she made them pay every time for choosing the one-on-one. </p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p></p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p> </p> <!-- /wp:paragraph -->