The Gustavus Volleyball team will wrap up their season on Saturday, Nov. 2 in the Gustavus Triangular Tournament, where they will host Buena Vista University and University of Wisconsin-Superior. As of Oct. 26, the team has a record of 9-19 overall and a record of 3-7 in the MIAC. Suffering a loss to Bethel on Oct. 23, the team did not qualify to play in the conference tournament, where the top six teams in the tournament will compete.

At the beginning of the season, the team suffered four losses in a row, but began to turn it around with a 3-2 win against the University of Northwestern and a 3-1 win against University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire at the Augsburg Tournament on Sept. 6-7.

From that point on, the team experienced a combination of wins and losses, winning three of four matches at the Gustavus Tournament on Sept. 13-14 against University of Wisconsin-River Falls, Central College, and Bethany Lutheran College, only losing to Simpson College. Junior Taylor Meurer believes that the general attitude of the team has changed as the season has progressed.

“The attitude has definitely changed from pressure to win games to just playing to have fun, which should have been the attitude all season. But with a highly competitive team like ours, it’s hard not to feel pressured to win,” Meurer said.

On Sept. 18, the team won 3-0 against Carleton College. A few days later, on Sept. 21, they experienced two conference losses where they fell short to the University of St. Thomas 0-3 and lost to Hamline University 0-3.

Two conference wins against Macalester College and St. Olaf College followed these losses, where the team beat Macalester 3-1 on Sept. 28, and again against St. Olaf on Oct. 2, with a score of 3-1. A series of ups and downs, continued to show in their record.

“We’re really inconsistent this year, but we have really good moments. We’re up and down,” Junior Paige Breneman said.

The team suffered two losses in the Northwestern Triangular on Oct. 5 and another loss to Augsburg College on Oct. 9. In the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire tournament, the team lost 0-3 to the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point. After a win against University of Wisconsin-Stout, the team experienced six more losses in a row.

Though the scoreboard didn’t show it, Breneman believes that the team’s 2-3 loss to Concordia College on Oct. 18 was one of the team’s best moments.

“Even though we lost, we still took the number one team in the conference to five games,” Breneman said.

As a young group with no seniors, the team has focused this season on building a championship culture. Head Volleyball Coach Rachelle Sherden tells her players to not only be excellent players on the court, but to be excellent leaders as well.

“It’s training people to be leaders and then kind of creating a culture with tough and mentally tough championship mentality. It’s a process going through it, it’s been up and down, but the team definitely has more potential than we’ve had in the past four years. Even though this season has been tough, moving forward there’s a lot of good lessons from it,” Sherden said.

Many of the young team’s favorite moments of the season, come, not only from successes on the court, but off the court, as well. The team retreat at the beginning of the season has proven to have helped the Gustavus Volleyball team form strong bonds.

“Our chemistry off the court is a major strength for us. I don’t think a lot of teams would be able to say that every single member of their team gets along with one another. We need to work on bringing that chemistry into our games,” Meurer said.

Working to build a championship volleyball team, Sherden will strive to create a standout volleyball program for Gustavus in the extremely competitive MIAC conference.

“We have three teams in the top 13 in the nation in our conference. To have that and be able to get your way in there is just going to take players that are committed, that work really, really hard, and of course have the talent. So, building on some fundamentals, there’s no doubt that it’s going to happen, it’s just continuing to build that championship culture and then getting the players in here that are going to contribute from the talent side,” Sherden said.

Moving forward, the players also have high hopes for next season. Meurer believes that the bond the young team has formed will contribute to the team’s success in future seasons.

“The 2013 season will be in the past and there is no reason to dwell on the past. Even though we do not lose any seniors this year, the 2014 team will be completely different; with first year’s coming and everyone else gaining another year of experience under they’re belts. Next season should be a fun one,” Meurer said.