Dragons along with the crowd stuns Maples in three games

Written Friday October 5th, at 12:00 PM

Shocking is an understatement but this match was beyond shocking and then some.

After winning over Troy at home on Tuesday night the Birmingham Seaholm Maples came in with confidence they could go into Lake Orion and win.

However the Maples found out the hard way what a hostile environment could be.

Behind a hostile crowd, the fifth ranked Dragons came out ready to play on it's home court and destroyed the Maples 25-11, 25-22, 25-15.

But the crowd known as the Madhouse of Madison wasn't the only factor why the Maples had problems all night. The Dragons themselves came ready to play.

Lake Orion came out firing early from the get go. In the first game the Dragons were up 12-0 at one point forcing Seaholm coach Heather Lippert to call both her timeouts to calm her team down. Lake Orion would remain on cruise control to win the game one in a shockingly 25-11 drubbing of the Maples. Seaholm just couldn't get a break from the officials or line judges which added to it's troubles.

The second game was interesting, the crowd was getting to the Maples players and coaches. Lippert asked the refs to tell them to stop calling the players names. The confusion got the refs, Dragons coach Ross Talbott, and some Lake Orion administrators over to the crowd to keep them in check. Once the crowd was on check and gave golf claps, Seaholm gained the much needed break they needed and also some much needed momentum like they did in the Troy game. The Maples got kills from Lisa White, Claire Meads, Kathy Quigley, and Erin Neudenfelt along with aces from Andrea Gothard and White herself. The Dragons controlled things early once again with the play of Sophie Murdock, Tess Marshall, Hannah Murdock, among others.

Birmingham Seaholm came all the way back to tie the score at 20-20, taking the crowd out of the game. However when the game was tied up, the Dragons crowd came back to life and so did the Dragons themselves feeding of the crowd noise. Lake Orion and Seaholm would battle it out to the very end, eventually the Dragons would beat the Maples in a tight game two 25-22.

The third game was the most critical as it was for both teams earlier in the week. The Dragons blitzkrieg the Rochester Falcons with an early rally on Monday night 25-14. The Maples came from behind to stun Troy 26-24 in the third game winning the match in five games on Tuesday night.

But on Thursday, game three was a relapse of game one.

The Dragons attacked early and often and would at one point take a 13-5 lead on the Maples forcing Lippert to call both of her timeouts. Lake Orion never looked back winning 25-15 to shocking sweep the Maples in three games.

It was a long night for Heather Lippert's crew on Thursday night with the crowd noise along with her team not playing well. The Maples just looked out of sink with the crowd noise and struggles all night. Lets also know that besides the Big Three on Seaholm (Neudenfelt, Quigley, an Gothard) is that they are a young team and usually young teams struggle on the road. That's normal with a young team, young teams prefer to play at home with the surroundings. I personally think that a game like this will help Seaholm in the long run especially when to deal with crowd noise. The Maples do see Birmingham Marian in their district in the playoffs and they do have a hostile crowd themselves, like Lake Orion. I wouldn't want to see Birmingham Seaholm in the playoffs, the Maples are a very good and talented team.

It was just another day in the office for coach Ross Talbott but he did see improvement with his girls from Rochester on Monday night. They played to their capabilities like a state ranked team. Lake Orion has the Beast of the East tournament this weekend with Mattawan, Clarkston, and Macomb Dakota all coming to that tournament but this is just another step in the process for the Dragons. The next step will be Farmington on the road on Tuesday night.

I thought Lake Orion did well with it's game plan. The Dragons won the libero battle (Gabby Kalugar over Andrea Gothard) and outplayed the Maples. I was disappointed that Seaholm did not prepare for the hostile crowd. Some of their players saw the Rochester game on Monday night including Lippert. The Maples knew what to expect but the crowd wasn't the reason why the Maples lost on Thursday night, they were just outplayed in an hostile environment.