Watch a live feed of the matches on the Otero website located at www.ojc.athletics.edu
The Western Nebraska Community College volleyball team will be aiming for its 18th straight Region IX championship this weekend in La Junta, Colorado.
The Cougars, 31-4 and the top seed, will get action underway Friday at 11 a.m. against Lamar Community College, who swept McCook Community College Thursday night.
NJC, the second seed, will play Friday at 9 a.m. against No. 3-seed Otero Junior College. The Rattlers, who are hosting ht etournament defeated Trinidad State 3-1 Thursday night. The two morning winners will advance to play at 5 p.m. Friday.
The double elimination tournament continues through Saturday with the championship game slated for 1 p.m. The winner advances to the national tournament Nov. 17-19 in Casper, Wyoming.
For the Cougar players, they realize how important this tournament is and what they have to do.
"We will have to play really focused and concentrated this weekend," sophomore Lara Picht said. "We lost to Otero [during the regular season] and we might play them again and NJC too. They are good teams this year and we have to fight hard for the win."
This year's regional tournament is definitely up for grabs. The Cougars did suffer a South Conference loss to Otero in October in four sets and came back to defeat NJC in five sets at Cougar Palace after being down 2-0 just last week. Picht said they have had good practices the last week and should be ready.
"We practiced hard the last week and I feel like we are ready," she said. "We just have to see if we keep up the energy and play together."
Energy is definitely the key in getting wins. Picht said they cannot get behind like they have done so many matches this year and come back and win in five. They have to start playing from the start.
"That is one of the most important things in that we start from the beginning and not wait two sets before we actually start playing," the sophomore from Germany said. "One of the key things is energy and we have to play together this weekend."
WNCC won the Region IX South with a 9-1 record while NJC and Otero were both 7-3. The Cougars enter the tournament with a loss, falling to No. 3 Iowa Western Community College on Saturday in four sets. Still, the Cougars can live with that loss knowing that they played well against a very good team.
"We played pretty good against Iowa Western," Picht said. "It wasn't our best game and they are a really good team. But we actually played with a lot of energy and played very well."