Congratulation is in order for our 17 OPEN team. 

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Congratulations to our 17 OPEN team.  In 2018 they secured the highest finish in our Clubs History as well as one of the highest finishes in Fort Wayne in 20+ years.  Impact VBC 17 Open finished 5th in the NATION at the 2018 AAU National Championship event in 17 OPEN division in Orlando, FL.  The team has made so many sacrifices throughout the year and have worked so hard to get to this point.   It was truly an amazing experience.  Below is a day by day .

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Day #1

Based on playing in 18 Open tournaments all year we were placed in a very tough pool with Alamo 17's, OT 17's and a great ball control team from Hawaii called RVC.  We started off with RVC and just did not play well losing in 2 close games.  It really was a match we needed to win.  We then came out strong against OT 17's who were ranked 6th overall in the event.  We had a nice lead on them until Maddie Schermerhorn was hurt at 17-13.  Maddie made a comeback in 2 game but we could not overcome the lead we gave them.  However the team was playing well.  In the third match of the day we needed a win to stay alive.  The kids responded when their backs were against the wall.  We won easily in 2 25-17, 25-18.

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Day #2

This day we had our work cut out for us.  In our pool was former Champions Munciana 16-1's, then a strong Ohio team called Mavericks and a always good Dunes team.  We started off with the #1 seed in our pool the Mavericks who we have played in years past and been beat.  Anna Burkhardt had a match for the ages.  They had no answer for her hitting and she was everywhere digging their hitters.  We won a huge match in two!  The next match we had Munciana which was going to be a challenge.  We started off with a lead then we gave up two strings of points to go down to them 21-19.  We came back strong with great serve recieve passing and our middles really dominating to win 25-23.  Game two was much the same.  We played solid and jumped out to a 5 point lead early and just seemed to keep it throughout the game.  We won 25-21.  Based on how the pool went all we needed to do was win one game to guarantee us winning the pool and we lost game #1.  No worries, they came back strong in the second to win 25-19 and had a lead of 12-7 in the third but had a bad run losing in three.  We still secured first place in the pool and moved on.  

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Day #3

This is the crossover day.  You go straight to the GOLD Bracket.  If you take Second you have a crossover to get into the Gold Bracket.  Our first two matches we just dominated the teams.  It lead us to a match for 1st place in the pool with Top Select who was ranked 4th overall in the event.  We came out hungry and won 25-14.  However, we woke the sleeping bear I guess because they came back and did the same to us.  Game three we found our selves up 11-6 and thought we got 12 until the referee called a touch on us.  We again lost it a bit and feel to them 15-13 in the third.

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CHALLENGE MATCH

Well we had one game to get to the GOLD and it was going to take a great effort to get by a Phenomenal team out of Cincinnati by the name of Tri-States VBC.  The first set was back and forth sideouts.  They ran a inside 2nd tempo ball from the outside that we just could not seem to defend.  They squeezed by us 25-22.  Game three was much of the same.  Maddie Schermerhorn was amazing during this match with her hitting and defense.  We squeaked by them 25-23.  Game three we jumped out to a nice lead and again we sit at 11-6 in the third.  We all said enough is enough, we are taking this one home.  They got to 9 before we scored another point closing the gap to 12-9.  We traded points to go to 13-10.  The next play was pretty amazing.  Little did I know but Chloe Bontragger picked up a penny on the floor by our bench before the point.  We had a nice serve receive pass and set Madi Ellis in the middle.  She attempted to tip the ball to right back but it hit the net and rolled about 5' just dropping in 2' from the sideline.  14-10 us.  he next point Madie Ross put a good serve on them and they hit an out of system ball out.  15-10 we were in the GOLD DIvision of 17 OPEN.

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Day #4

Today is the Gold Playoffs so we are in a true Elimination round. 

We face National recognized KIVA 17 Red.  They lived up to their

hype.  The first set they were amazing.  Nothing we did worked. 

They were in a Zone.  Game two we got a jump on them but they

came back early and took a lead on us.  We were not gonna go

down easy.  We made some great plays to catch them at 19-19 forcing

them to call a late timeout.  Unfortunately the y were just too good

this day and we went down 25-21.

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The good news was we finished high enough for us to get an

All-American to be named off of our team.  We received the news

that Maddie Schermerhorn was once again named to the

All-American team.  Our whole team played great all week but

Anna Burkhardt carried us day 2 and Maddie carried us on Day 3. 

They both had Amazing weeks and we are excited that we once

again had an All-American in Maddie Schermerhorn.