Pete volleyball championship tourney begins May 6

Published May 6, 2008
By Walt Johnson
21st Space Wing sports reporter

PETERSON AIR FORCE BASE, Colo. -- It's the stuff dreams are made of for people who like top-level competition and it will be on display at the Peterson Sports and Fitness Center at 11 a.m. May 6.

The Peterson competitive league volleyball championship tournament begins with four teams vying to win the championship Air Force Space Command now holds. The four teams in the running for this year's title are: North American Aerospace Defense Command/U.S. Northern Command, Team Colorado, AFSPC and the Air Force Operational Test and Evaluation Center.

NORAD/NORTHCOM will come into this year's tournament as the number one seed after having an exceptional regular season that saw it lose only one game, to the defending champion AFSPC team, all year. NORAD/NORTHCOM will take on AFOTEC in the first game of the tournament at 11.am. and that contest will be followed by a heavyweight battle that will be worth the price of admission - if admission was charged - to view the game. AFSPC will meet Team Colorado at noon in what will really be a fight at the OK Corral type event.

Maj. Judy Kelley, AFSPC coach said the game between her team and Team Colorado will have some resemblance to the one portion of the NBA playoffs and be a good test to see who will be in the best position to beat NORAD/NORTHCOM team.

"You have to understand it's like the Western Conference of the NBA out here, anyone can beat anyone on any given day," Major Kelley said.

That is a very true statement according to Mike Coats, intramural sports director who said this is going to be a very exciting playoff series and he doesn't know who will win but he said the line of separation between the teams is razor thin.

"I think the top three teams are very competitive and they all play very competitive volleyball," said Mr. Coats. "Each of those teams play excellent volleyball. They are so close that it may depend on what day it is as to which team will win. NORTHCOM is going to be tough to beat. The one game they lost this year was when they played without its whole team. They finished first in the league this year, the matches have been close against the other top teams in the league but I feel they are probably the favorites going into the tournament,"

Paul Matheny is the coach for Team Colorado which for the past three years has found itself the marked target for other team's coming into the playoffs. This year Coach Matheny said another team has the burden of being the targeted team and that may not be all bad for his team.

"It's going to be a relief to go into the playoffs without having the target on our chest," said Coach Matheny. "We won't be going in as regular season champions either and we can just concentrate on being a dark horse team. It's a little easier coming into the tournament not the favorite but by the same token we didn't just fall off the picture and we are not a contender we feel we are. We want to contend against the top teams and we still want to be in a position to give them a run for their money in this tournament," .

NORAD/NORTHCOM is going to be the team to beat this year and not Team Colorado. Hopefully we can get all our guys back from TDYs and other mission related things and actually have our full team so we can compete against them guys. It's going to be such a struggle. If NORTHCOM has all its guys and if Air Force Space brings all its players it is going to be a big struggle between those two teams and us. Northcom has all the players and skills it needs to win this thing. They have a lot of veteran experienced players and they are the odds on favorite to win. If we have all our guys we would think the odds of them winning would go down, but they are a solid team," Coach Matheny added.

While Coach Matheny and Mr. Coats were ready to believe NORAD/NORTHCOM is the team to beat Major Kelley said maybe that isn't the case.

"NORAD/NORTHCOM has a very strong and experienced team but remember its loss during the regular season was to the AFSPC all stars, which is now the name of our team," said Major Kelley. "We think we can be competitive against them. I think we have a lot of experience and some new people that will pick up our intensity much like we did last year where we came in and swept through the tournament. I think the playoffs will the time for us to step up our intensity and we'll see how it turns out,"

Peterson intramural volleyball underway