NMMI Sports Press
The New Mexico Military Institute Broncos took the first match of the 14th Annual NMMI Classic volleyball tournament Thursday night 3-1 over the visiting Eastern Arizona College Gila Monsters.
The win was also a christening for the newly upgraded Cahoon Armory Gym, which was packed with fans on the bench side and packed with a rowdy Corps of Cadets on the other, something that probably took the other team by surprise.
"It was such a cool environment and the Corps had our back," said Bronco head coach Shelby Forchtner. "The minute they all started piling in here, our team was pumped, they were booing the other team and I was like 'oh, no' (laugh), but it was just awesome and they stayed pretty hyped for the entire game."
The Broncos used stout defense to keep the Monsters off balance, winning the first set 25-16, dropping the second 23-25, and then taking the final two sets 25-16 and 25-17.
All-American sophomore libero Mio Yamamoto led the defensive effort with 13 digs and only two receiving errors. Sophomore outside hitter Baby Moleni had 11 digs and sophomore setter Megan Waghorn and freshman opposite Leah Linares each saved 10 balls.
"Our defense really held us together. We dug a lot of balls and got a lot of touches off the block," Forchtner said. "They were way bigger than us across the net, which was a little surprising to see a team bigger than we are, but it was nice to watch out defense work."
Forchtner said the difference between Yamamoto and other liberos is her control.
"She digs almost everything in system, whereas a lot of other liberos dig and get balls up, but Mio gets it up right in the pocket where our setter is supposed to be," Forchtner said. "She just sees everything so well and she played effortlessly, just so smooth. We're going to need that from her all year."
On the offensive side, the bulk of the big shots came from Moleni and sophomore outside hitter/opposite Aliyah Tokelau, who each had 12 kills. Freshman middle blocker Vitoria Oliveira also had seven hard kills.
"Those girls can absolutely annihilate a ball," said Forchtner. "Especially when our setters are deceptive and they have a small window, they can hit it really hard so we want to get them the ball more efficiently than we did tonight."
Forchtner was pleased with her squad's performance, but acknowledged that there is plenty of room for improvement.
"We need to work on our connections with our setters and we knew we were still behind on that, but it'll come," she said. "We have some freshman out there playing and one setter that didn't play much last year, so we just need to find a comfortable rhythm with our setters. At times, we're hard to stop, but there were also time they were able to see exactly what we were doing, so we need to be more deceptive."
The NMMI Classic continues Saturday with matches at Cahoon Armory and the Godfrey Athletic Center starting at 9 a.m.
The Broncos next match is at 1 pm. Saturday at Cahoon against Northeastern Junior College which features former local high school player Sidney Bills.