Game Three Costs Dragons Dearly in Five Game Loss to Maples.

Written Tuesday October 22nd, at 11:30 PM

The term confidence has always been the focal point for Birmingham Seaholm.

Ever since the Maples went five games against Clarkston (lost that match), Birmingham Seaholm Coach Heather Lippert said that her team was gaining more confidence every single match.

We all know that the Maple Forest is not kind to visitors and their beloved Maples were struggling early in the season after last season’s trip to the state quarterfinals but tonight was probably the biggest win in the regular season for Lippert and her young Birmingham Seaholm squad.

Birmingham Seaholm upset Lake Orion in five games 25-17, 12-25, 27-25, 21-25, and 15-13 in Birmingham.

The loss to the Maples means that the Dragons are out of the Red race and can focus on their path to the playoffs.

The turning point of the match was Game Three.

In a game that the Dragons had the match in the bag, up 20-14 just needing five points to win the set to go up two games to one and control the match. Lake Orion was outscored by Birmingham Seaholm 13-5 and ended up losing 27-25 in the third set. The Maples went to the middle, something that had been the Dragons weakness most of the season and used their defense along with useful serving from Eleni Barr to ride the comeback.

It was game on after that.

The Dragons managed to beat Birmingham Seaholm 25-21 after leading 14-7 early in the fourth set early only to see the Maples storm back and make it interesting. Both teams went five games on Thursday, Lake Orion with Oxford and Birmingham Seaholm with Clarkston.

The Maples took a 13-10 lead late in game five only to see the Dragons answer by tying the score 13-13 but in the end Birmingham Seaholm found a way to win and get those final two points on the night.

Hannah Murdock led the Dragons with 19 kills, Tess Marshall had nine kills, Maddie Hargraves had seven kills, and Rachel Giwa had 38 assists on the night.

Lauren McLeod led the Maples with 17 kills, Kate Carey had 13 kills, and Emma Schiefelbien had nine kills on the night.

Tonight was the perfect storm for the Maples. The Maple Forest was hostile and loud and the Dragons struggled tonight with service errors and mental mistakes. Birmingham Seaholm came to play, Lake Orion did not and when you make mistakes, you won’t last long even in the postseason.

I’m going to be honest. This was a horrible loss, just horrible for the Dragons. Probably a perfect example of this would be the infamous Dennis Green press conference when he was in Arizona and he said “We are who they thought they were and we let them off the hook” in reference to the loss to the Chicago Bears. Lake Orion had game three all wrapped up in the bag but mental errors and mistakes along with good play from Birmingham Seaholm gave them a chance to believe and that’s what happened tonight.

There was no doubt Lake Orion was the better team on paper but tonight Birmingham Seaholm with their crowd found a way to match the energy of the Dragons and then take it from them.

I just don’t know why Birmingham Seaholm has been a problem place for Lake Orion on the road especially in Boys Basketball and Volleyball. In Boys Basketball, the Maples are always good and talented, last season they had Paris Bass and now he is gone to Detroit Mercy. Birmingham Seaholm is still going to be a very good team, their Junior Varsity team was very good last season and now most of them are expected to make the move up to Varsity for Coach Jose Andreas and they do play Lake Orion twice this season since they are in the same division (White). In Volleyball, Lippert always prepares her teams well no matter if they are veteran or they are young. She just finds a way to get her team’s to compete and do well in doing it. 

However in Lake Orion, the role is reversed its Birmingham Seaholm that has the problems in the Dragons Lair when it comes to dealing with the crowd and hostility, example last year when the Maples were routed by the Dragons in three sets, Lippert and her players had big problems with the Dragons crowd that night. Not to be moody but if this match was at Lake Orion tonight, I don’t think Birmingham Seaholm wins.

There should be a lot of angry and disappointed people around Lake Orion and especially coach Ross Talbott has to be very upset and disappointed with his team. I’ll say this we aren’t in districts yet and if they play like this than Clarkston will come in and we’ll have a repeat of last week’s four game loss to the Wolves.

The Dragons will now focus its attention to Senior Night when Troy comes a calling for the final regular season game of the season. The Colts have been struggling all season ever since the loss of Olivia Parks to an ACL injury. We’ll see what happens.