Missouri Juniors Punch Ticket in 18 American

Photo: Missouri Jrs. 18 Parents Twitter

Vernon Birmingham January 19, 2023 @ 01:13 PM

If you've ever read an article of mine about qualifiers you've heard me say time and time again, "The American division is the toughest route to a bid". Generally speaking, you have to be perfect over the course of three days and can't suffer any hiccups. Well, that's what Missouri Juniors 18-1 did last weekend, going 10-0 en route to a bid and a chance to now compete in other divisions throughout the remainder of the qualifying season.   48 teams entered into one of the earliest qualifiers of the season in Kansas City at the MLK Tournament. We mentioned in our 18 Open previews and it's worth repeating, it's hard to worry about seeding this early in the year as many teams don't have many matches under their belts. However, Missouri Juniors did come in as the top seed in Pool 6, equivalent to the 6th overall seed. Since we know they were perfect on day 1, we think it's important to also highlight the other Heart of America (HOA) and Gateway (GW) teams who breezed through the first day of competition.   Static (HOA) won Pool 3, and Invasion 18 Blue (HOA) was on top in Pool 4. Over in Pool 5, 417 Columbia 18-1 was 3-0. Down in Pool 8, Shockwave 18 Gold didn't drop a set. Another 417 squad in 417 Juniors 18 National Royal ran the table in Pool 9. And rounding out the action in Pool 12, Summit Volleyball Club won their pool.   The top 2 teams from each pool would advance to reseeded pools for a chance at the lone available bid. From there, only the pool winners would advance to bracket play on Monday. Missouri Juniors enters this club season with a talented roster that includes Class 4 All-State honoree Landrey VanOverschelde. She had just under 2000 assists in her career totaling 1996. [player_tooltip player_id='168912' first='Holly' last='Heldt'] earned Class 2 All-State for Hermann after 617 kills on the year and brings that scoring ability to this club.   Missouri Juniors opened Sunday with a first-set win, -17 over Portland VBC 18-1. The second set was like a heavyweight fight with both teams trading blows. Good play down the stretch from middle [player_tooltip player_id='150016' first='Anna' last='Wekenborg'], from state champion Blair Oaks, helped them keep Portland at bay with a 27-25 win. The Central Missouri club didn't have many problems the rest of the day winning the other two matches in straight sets to advance to the Day 3 gold bracket.   Dalton Tucket's team set sights on day 3 on a mission and Kairos 18 Beta was the innocent bystander as they were molly-whopped in set 1, 25-6. However, they gave the Missouri team all they could handle in set 2 but [player_tooltip player_id='150017' first='Hannah' last='Luetkemeyer'] and her defensive plays were on display as Juniors ended it 25-23.   The next match saw Missouri Juniors drop their first set of the tournament to Static Volleyball, -19. They regrouped and came out dominant in set two, building. alead. and not looking back as they ran away with a -13 win. The first of what I would call a high-pressure situation of the weekend developed with a must-win set for Juniors and they have no problems with a 15-6 convincing third set victory to win the match.   It was all downhill from here as they had little challenge beating Adrenaline 18 Deb and Iowa PowerPlex in the semi-final and finals by a combined 36 points to bring home the championship and bid to nationals. Other players on this roster not mentioned above who contributed to this championship: [player_tooltip player_id='150015' first='Jordyn' last='Butler'], Katherine Keevins, Makenzie Sorrels, [player_tooltip player_id='152146' first='Kyra' last='Thomas'], Madison Threlkeld, and [player_tooltip player_id='152139' first='Emma' last='Whitson'].

If you've ever read an article of mine about qualifiers you've heard me say time and time again, "The American division is the toughest route to a bid". Generally speaking, you have to be perfect over the course of three days and can't suffer any hiccups. Well, that's what Missouri Juniors 18-1 did last weekend, going 10-0 en route to a bid and a chance to now compete in other divisions throughout the remainder of the qualifying season.