Roseville Girls Volleyball Team Aiming High for 2011

Coming up short in consecutive sectional tournaments, the Roseville High School Raiders volleyball team looks clear that hurdle this season.

“We’re expecting to go far and push for state,” Raiders junior captain Melissa Koop said.

She and her twin sister, Meghan, have been starters for the Raiders during the past two seasons. In that time, they helped the Raiders reach the section finals in 2009 and the section quarterfinals in 2010. But, they have yet to reach the state tournament at the Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul.

They return as two of four starters for the Raiders this season. In addition, the will serve as two of the three team captains this season with Amber Arcand.

“We’re motivated to go a lot further this year,” Arcand said.

The Raiders went 15-13 overall last year and posted a 4-5 record in the challenging Suburban East Conference. In section quarterfinals, the Raiders fell in three games to Woodbury.  

“It was a great season,” Raiders coach Greg Ueland said. “The Suburban East is a tough conference. We expect a lot of great things again this season.”

In their third day of practice on Wednesday, the girls concluded with an intense intra-squad scrimmage. The kept the volleys long and their energy high.

“We have a lot of good team chemistry,” Ueland said. “They’re pushing each other to be champions. We’re striving to win conference, the section and reach the Excel.”

Ueland says his team specializes in ball control and defense. His players put in extra time to learn the game and practice the fundamentals. Groups of five to six players came over to the RAHS gym in the morning during the summer months to practice. The extra effort has showed up during the season too.

“We have players staying after practice and putting in more time,” Meghan Koop said.

The Raiders will get their first look at how their extra efforts have paid off when the open the season at White Bear Lake on Tuesday, Aug. 30.