Always did love my Granddaddy!!

What a weekend. Ups and downs all over the place but certainly ended on a high note for Phil and I. Not going to lie to you, both Phil and I are physically and mentally pretty drained. Overload with travel, volleyball, and everything in between. That made it all the sweeter though to be able to focus in on the task at hand and get it done.

Phil and I were the third seeded team behind Stein and Lambo (1) and Jake and Rosy (2). Our first round was against Sabla/Rupp. Played Sabla last year and I know of Rupp from his days at UCI. They played solid volleyball and we were a bit lackadaisacal in my opinion but focused in at the end of the games and won each one by 6 or 7 points. Our next match was against the good team of Wong/Mayer. KK is injured so Wong picked up Mayer for MB. Good pickup too. I think very highly of Mayer' game. We battled them and were fortunate to come out with a 21-19, 21-18 win. It was a good game highlighted with some fireworks between Wong and I. Nothing major, just competitive chatter if you will. :)

On Saturday we played team jump serve, Fred and Anthony, in the morning. Boy was team jump serve on their service game. Frankly, that is the best I have ever seen Fred and Anthony play. They both played exceptional ball and served extremely well. We mostly served Fred and he sided out very well. The first game we pulled away mid-game and won 21-14 or so. In the second game, Fred went off from the service line. At one point they were up 12-2. Fred served something like 10 points in a row. They all were bombs and they were all in. Pretty crazy actually. We "brought" it back to lose 21-13 or so. In the third game they continued to serve really well and sided out well too. They didn't get a ton of aces, just creating havoc with their serves. They tend to target Phil rather than me and he was struggling to pass their serves. I was bump setting him from 30 feet off the net and that puts a lot of pressure on me to set him decently and of course for him to put it away. The third was a battle but Anthony sided out to win 15-13. Congrats to them on what Anthony labeled probably his biggest win of his career. I will say this, it was not a fluke that they beat us as they took Jake and Rosy to three and then on Sunday morning they took out Stein and Lambo in 3 games to give Stein and Lambo a 5th place finish. They then battled Sean and Dax but eventually lost 15-13 in the third. Nice tourney by them and congrats to both of them.

So that loss sent Phil and I into the losers bracket. Not a fun place to be and one that Phil and I do our best to avoid at all cost. After the women's final we played Mariano and Ratledge. We played well and won by 5 or so points in each game. Our next match was against Scott Wong and Aaron Wachtfogel. It was the last game Saturday afternoon. I think Scott was a bit tired after going through the losers bracket. The first was competitive but we won by a couple of points. In the second we jumped out immediately and Scott was looking very weary. We won that game fairly easily to advance to Sunday.

On Sunday we played Mark Williams and Nick Lucena who had upset Keenan/Hyden on Saturday. We played very well and beat them in two game by about the scores of 17 and 17. This pitted us against Jake and Rosy who had gone through the winners bracket. It was Phil and I's first game on center court as the number three seed gets no love. I came out with my radar way off. I was seeing everything really well but when I went to execute it wasn't working the way I envisioned. We fell behind 8-2 in the first. I felt okay as we took a timeout as I knew I just had to clean it up and we would be good. I did just that and we fought back to win 24-22. In the second game we continued to play well and I think their sails were a bit deflated after losing that first game with a big lead. I think the score of the second was 14 or 13.

That put us in the finals against my old partners and buddies, Dax and Sean. I truly enjoy playing against both of them because I have nothing but respect for the way they play the game and of course all the banter we throw back and forth to one another. They were really strong in the first game. Sean sided out very well as we went after him in the first. Dax made some great digs and Sean was blocking well too. It was a battle back and forth throughout the first. In the end, Sean came up with a huge block vs. me to win it 22-20. The second was a battle until about 15-14. Then we pulled ahead as Sean hit a couple of balls out and I scooped Dax and put it away for a 3 point run. Score was 21-16. Throughout the game, Phil was really struggling with his serve. He wasn't hitting it very good and was missing a ton of serves. That changed dramatically in the third game and won the match for us. It was 5-5 as we had traded sideouts until Phil went back to the line. The next person to serve was Sean and when he went back to serve the score was 10-6. Phil served 5 straight points! The first was a good serve and then I think an error by Sean. The next was a block by Phil. The next was a net dribbler ace. Phil seems to like those at critical times in MB. They took a timeout and then Phil came out and bombed one down Sean's line for an ace. We got a 1oth point before they sided out. We kept the lead until the end, winning 15-11 on a line shot for a sideout by me.

It was a great win for Phil and I and got us another place on the MB pier. It's always nice to know you are immortalized on the pier.