COLORADO SPRINGS – The defending champions are peaking at the right time. The Rampart girls volleyball team is heading back to the Broadmoor World Arena after claiming the Region 6 championship, beating Columbine and Cherokee Trail both in straight sets.
This is far from the same Rampart team that claimed last year’s Class 5A state title, but despite losing two Division I hitters, these Rams might be just as dangerous.
It shouldn’t be their work at regionals that should scare teams, but rather their work from the weekend before. Rampart battled through five tough matches, against tops teams in both 4A and 5A to win the Cheyenne Mountain Tournament, which has become a measuring stick of sorts heading into the postseason.
“We started a little slow and our match against Palmer Ridge was a little rough,” sophomore Izzy Starck said. “At Cheyenne Mountain is where we really found ourselves and this is where we’re really peaking and we’ll be good at state for that.”
The Rams (21-4 overall) may not have dropped a set through the day but advancing back to state was anything but easy. Coach Nikki Bloemen acknowledged the difficulty of the region while watching the Rebels and Cougars battle through five sets in their matchup.
Columbine got the win after losing its first matchup to Rampart, giving the Rams a massive edge heading into the last match of the day. Not only was it a win-and-in situation, but a five-set battle for the Cougars sapped a ton of energy from the floor and from the bench.
Still, the Rams had no desire to make the day more difficult than it had to be. They won the first 25-19 and battled through a close second set to win 28-26. They had more control of the third set and won it 25-18 to officially punch their ticket to state. Starck combined for 26 kills in the two matches and Audrey Hollis dished out 26 combined assists.
“We talked about this weekend if we can come in playing like we did last weekend, we’d be successful,” Bloemen said. “If we were up and down like we had been to for most of the season we’d struggle, but for the most part I thought we were really consistent today.
The Rams now have the daunting task of going back to the building where they claimed the program’s first state championship and defending that title. Capability is not in question. Not after they got wins over Grandview and Valor Christian at the Cheyenne Mountain Tournament and a win over Cherokee Trail, one of just two teams to hand Cherry Creek a loss this season.
“We won against Grandview at state and we lost two (key) players,” Starck said. “They thought they could beat us, but it’s just the swag we had to beat them in five even though we lost those players. This year with a whole new team, we were still able to do that.”
This is the third straight appearance in the state tournament for the Rams. They missed out on state each year from 2015-18 but have been a tough team to beat for the last three seasons. They’re hoping that the wins they’ve amassed in the last two weeks is representative of the fact that they are indeed peaking at the right time. And if that’s the case, a second straight championship is certainly in play.
“It’s nice because most of our team has been there,” Bloemen said. “Those that weren’t have done a really good job of learning from those who were there and building on the positive things that happened last year that are happening again this year.”
