Ramapo Volleyball Learns the Hard Way

With all the youth and inexperience they brought into the season, Ramapo was certainly entitled to have stutter-step. That it came Thursday, in the Raiders’ 10^th match of the year—a 25-21, 24-26, 25-9 loss at Paramus Catholic—left the wounded upstarts dealing with their first taste of adversity this season.

“Our immaturity reared its head today,” said Coach Dave Van Hook. “We haven’t shown a lot of inconsistency this season, and it’s a disappointing loss. We can’t be as complacent as we were today and expect to win. It’s a valuable lesson for us: if we don’t come to play, we’ll lose every time.”

Paramus Catholic stormed out of the gate quickly in each game. In the opener, they played fearlessly, jumping out to leads of 13-5 and 17-9 before Ramapo seemed to remember they were 8-1 on the season, and had been named the fifth seed for the county tournament Wednesday night. They gathered their composure and fought back to within 23-21, but couldn’t overcome the Paladins, a team that Van Hook said “was simply outstanding in every aspect of the game.”

In the second game, Ramapo overcame a 20-13 deficit to win 26-24. Rather than build on that momentum and sustain the flashes of brilliance they displayed, Ramapo came out flat in the third game, and stayed that way throughout in dropping the decisive game.

“We knew this was a good team, and we had a great practice yesterday. I was sure we were prepared to play today,” said Van Hook. “We’ve hardly watched any tape this year, but we watched tape of this team. We knew they were greatly improved, and they really took it to us. They deserved to win today—and they deserved to beat us in two games.”

Paramus Catholic, now 7-4 on the season, was led by 16 kills from Georgette Smith. They are seeded 15^th in the county tournament, and square off with No. 18, Rutherford, on Saturday. Since opening the season with three losses against staunch opponents IHA, Northern Highlands and Ramapo, they’ve hit their stride under first-year coach Jaime Marzocchi.

“After starting 0-3 we won the Clifton Tournament and started to gain confidence and see what we’re capable of,” said Marzocchi, who inherited a team with 10 seniors. “We entered this match with a different mindset than we did the first time we faced Ramapo. We’re a different team now. We have another big match tomorrow, and open the county tournament on Saturday, but we didn’t let that enter our minds. We’re a team that lives in the now.”

Although it was only a seedings meeting, Ramapo learned the hard way that life is going to be tougher now that opponents will be braced for one of the top teams in north Jersey.

“The bulls-eye on our backs got bigger and bigger with that fifth seed,” said Van Hook. “Today was more of a mental lapse than anything. We have to let it go. We’ve got two matches in the next two days [Dumont on Friday and the county tournament opener against 28^th-seeded Saddle Brook], and we’ve got to shake this off.”