"Ready, ready, up!"

The ball just tipped off of my teammate Mikayla's hands and flew back towards me. I passed it to Kaitlyn, the setter on my team and she quickly set it back to Mikayla who slammed it into the ground so fast that I couldn’t even see the ball hit the floor. We got the point, and came to the middle of the court cheering as loud as we could to irritate the opposing team, Amador Elite from Amador High School, who happened to be our rival. The look on their faces revealed that they were getting upset with themselves and with each other because we were starting to catch up to them.
We got two more points, and then I saw the look on their coach's face, I could tell that he was not too happy with his team, so he quickly called a timeout. I rushed off the court with the rest of my team and huddled around our coach Jaime. I could already tell what she was going to say. I knew her inside and out, just as she knew me inside and out as well, since she had been my coach for the past two seasons, which were each six months long. She then told us, "Stay calm, don't pay attention to the score and keep it up.You've got to get in their heads, so keep cheering. You can't get down if you make a mistake because they will recognize it and try to get in your head, so keep it up. Now get out there and play."
Before I walked onto the court, I glanced over at the score, which I shouldn't have done because it made me more nervous. It was 13 to 12, we were down by one. I told myself “Stay calm, it's just a game," but the truth was, it was more than just a game. It was the game we had been waiting for all season. We wanted to prove not just to ourselves but to our rival, Amador, that we were competition. We wanted the win so bad we could taste it.
The game resumed, and we scored another point. Making it tied at 13 to 13. We served again and they set up their play and got a kill, which meant that if they scored one more point, they would win. But I knew we wouldn't let that happen. They served and it went into the net. It was tied again. The game is supposed to go to 15 but in order to win you have to beat the other team by two points. They got another point, so they only need one more to win, again.
As I watched the ball fly slowly through the air, I started to think about how amazing it would be to beat them, to set an example to others that if you work hard and you want something so badly, you can get it. But, on the other hand, losing would be incredibly heart breaking. All I was trying to think about was winning and doing the best I could do by not letting the ball drop and not making any mistakes. A second later I heard a loud "bam" and saw the ball coming towards me. As it got closer, I thought about where I was on the court and stepped away to let it pass me, I was hoping and praying that it would go out of bounds. I turned around to see where it landed. Luckily, it landed about 5 inches behind the end line and I took a huge sigh of relief. Until I saw the line judge, a small girl from a Sacramento team who wasn’t very good, call the ball in. I couldn’t believe my eyes, "Did she just call that in?" I said to my teammate. My whole team rushed over like a wave coming onto shore.We immediately started yelling at her. I pointed and showed her where the ball landed, but all she did was quietly stand in the corner not showing any emotion or sympathy. I heard all the parents of my teammates yelling at the referee to do something, but he said he couldn’t change the call because he didn't see the exact spot where the ball landed. I couldn’t believe it,we had just lost the game. I had felt so guilty. If I had passed the ball instead of letting it go, we could have won. I could not stop thinking about it all day, it started to get to me and when I talked about it, I started to cry. It wasn't a sad cry, but more of a frustrated and defeated cry. I felt so defeated because we were so close to that win, and then to not get it was heart wrenching. It was everything I didn't want to happen to me. It was my worst nightmare, to be the person who make the mistake and who loses the game for their team.
My coach told us after the game "Its a hard defeat, you guys played hard, but next time you’ve got to come out and play harder, if you do your time will come, you just have to wait for it." At that point I was still too upset to think about anything she said to us. We left the tournament right afterward because we were eliminated. We tried to keep our heads held high, thinking about all the great things we did, but really we were just hoping to return next time with a better outcome, than we had today.

The next two weeks of practice, I worked harder than I ever had. I was determined to get back to the next tournament and beat our rivals. For instance, the night of practice before the next tournament, I started to slow down while I was doing sprints, my feet started to drag behind me, I could feel my body slowly starting to shut down, then suddenly my coach Jamie yelled "Push yourself! You can't give up, keep going!" And I thought to myself "You can't give up, because if you give up, you basically let them win" And I kept going, running faster and pushing myself even harder than I ever thought I could.

The next tournament came around quicker than expected and we more than hungry for victory. We were done with defeat. It was feeling we never wanted to feel again. That morning I knew it was going to be a good day.
Playing as hard as ever in all the games that day, we landed a spot in the championship. Against our rivals, Amador Elite. They had just beat us in the first set 18 to 25. But we were not ready to let them have it, not again. We went out hard and beat them 15 to 25 in the second set. They were almost in disbelief because they thought they were going just going to give up, but that was the last thing we did. The third set started, we got the first serve. My teammate, Kaitlyn, served seven times in a row, racking up seven points. It was looking good for us. The score was 3 to 14, it was my turn to serve.
As I went back to the end line, a million thoughts were going through my mind. I bounced the ball, one, two, three, spun the ball in my hand a few times, feeling the lines on it and then tossed it and make contact with it. As it was spinning through the air, I was hoping that I would ace it and we would win, but they were able to pass it. I rush back on the court, awaiting the ball to come over the net. I was ready for anything. I saw the middle hitter ready to hit. I knew she was aiming for me, so I got low, ready to pass the ball. She flew in the air, and made contact with the ball. "Bam" The ball flew about a foot over my head, I let it pass me again. This time feeling more confident about my judgement, it was out by a mile.That meant that we had won. We had just won the championship, it was the best feeling in the world. We celebrated in the middle of the court, cheering and chanting.We were ecstatic. The look on everyones face was priceless. I captured that moment in my mind, hoping to always remember it, along with everyone else. It was truly an everlasting moment. My coach told us "Everything that you guys went through the last month, was for this moment." She was so proud of us for finally accomplishing what we worked for after two years. And that made me think, life is just like a volleyball game, you win, you lose, but more importantly, you push yourself to do something great.