Manhattan High volleyball made history last season by winning their first league title. Their chance to do it again is hanging in the balance, as they lost two of the three matches of their home-opener on Sept. 6.

The team lost to former rivals Shawnee Heights and Seaman, giving Seaman a 1-0 lead in league play, setting MHS back 0-1. The only win of the night came from Silver Lake.

“… we started a little slow just because it’s the first home game. It’s only our third game of the season so it was just kind of getting settled and stuff,” senior Kia Wilson said. “We don’t communicate enough, then we get into holes and can’t get ourselves out. I just think that we came in strong wanting to win but we we got down on ourselves and that didn’t help.”

MHS beat Silver Lake 2-0 (25-20, 25-22), giving them momentum at the beginning of their second match of the night against Shawnee Heights. The Lady Indians started out strong winning the first set 25-15, but it would be short lived as the team struggle to maintain the lead, losing the second and third set (24-26, 22-25) and ultimately the match 1-2.

While MHS lost to Shawnee, the crowd and players were sitting on the edge of their seats as they watched the long, endless rallies climax into a single heart stopping play.

“I think teams are getting much better defense, which we have great defense,” head coach Lisa Kinderknecht said. “We’re keeping the ball alive even when [the opponent] is attacking the ball which makes for fun volleyball… I think [that in the long rallies] we keep sending them back over the net without attacking so we need to be more aggressive there.”

The team finished the night with playing the league opener, Seaman, which affected the future of their season. With the home crowd nearly filling the bleachers, the spectator presence was immense throughout the match as neither team gave up a sizeable lead. The first set was neck and neck, ending in Seaman’s favor 22-25. MHS ended the match by losing the second set 19-25.

“When we’re battling so hard and there are so many teams battling their hearts out and so many teams are playing to win, we need to get on the winning end of those points in order to battle through some of those emotional games.” Kinderknecht said. “Seaman is a much improved team… we had some serving errors and against teams like that you have to make them earn their points and we have to earn ours as well. We had a few to many free balls that allowed them to get a strong offense against us.”

To some it was a regular volleyball match, but for the players, it was the beginning to an end, as this was the last home-opener for the senior class consisting of eight players.

“[Playing my last season] is honestly just really cool, it’s also sad,” Wilson said. “But then again, it’s not sad when you’re with your teammates because I’ve played with these girls since forever and they’re like family to me. It’s really great to just be able to share something with that like that with them.”