Unlike in past years, the Falcons have been attending mid-season tournaments like the one the team attended on Sept. 26-27 at Wilcox High. The team has chosen to risk sustaining injuries in these non-league games that don’t count toward overall results in order to help players gain more experience.
At the Wilcox tournament, Falcons placed fifth out of eight teams, after a 18-9 win against Santa Teresa and 17-10 win over Evergreen after a 13-12 loss toBranham.
While team members were not totally satisfied with results, players say they gained a lot of experience by playing against strong teams.
One key player was sophomore flat Samir Sharma, who stepped up to replace senior flat Kunal Bhatnagar, one of varsity’s strongest players. Bhatnagar was unable to play due to a concussion he suffered in the team’s game against Milpitas on Sept. 18.
“Samir has been doing a really good job, with good drops and strong game awareness,” senior set Nirvan Shah said. “All he needs is a bit more muscle and the ability to swim a bit faster and he’ll be really good.”.
Shah has also been playing a huge role on the team, drawing many ejections from opposing teams at set. During the game against Santa Teresa, for instance, Shah drew 12 ejections. The ejections have helped the team convert 6-5 situations into goals, score 5-meter penalties or permanently kick players out of the game.
Aside from Shah, junior wing Brian Le and Bunker have proven to be powerhouses on the offense, with Le having over 60 goals so far this season. Bunker, the team’s sprinter, has seen massive success on drives into the cage and smashing the ball into the net.
At practices, the team continues to improve their physical strength and clean up their passing technique, focusing primarily on improving the skill of players on the bench.
“That tournament, without Kunal, was a good learning experience for the rest of us, and we’re finally starting to move properly and pass the ball well. Once Kunal is back, we’re going to have a really strong performance during our league games,” Shah said.
