Alamo Heights’ senior middle blocker Tori Wesevich (center) goes up for a kill shot between Seguin’s Brooke Abrameit and Marcia Sagebiel. The lady Mules took the match in three straight games to end their three-match losing streak. Photo by Marvin Pfeiffer

To say that this past Friday’s win over the Seguin Lady Matadors was a big win would be an understatement. It was huge!

The girls, after coasting through most of the season and taking the first four matches in District 27-4A play, found themselves at a major roadblock in their path to the playoffs.

A string of three straight losses to New Braunfels Canyon, Boerne Champion and finally Steele had put a dent in their armor. All three matches were on the road and all three were important district contests.

New Braunfels Canyon was the first to knock down the Lady Mules a notch Sept. 30. They did so in five games by scores of 25-14, 11-25, 25-18, 21-25, and 15-17. It was a hard-fought match that either team could have emerged from victorious, but one the Lady Mules were unable to close out.

That was followed by a loss to Boerne Champion Oct. 3 in four games: 15-25, 25-14, 18-25 and 20-25. Two of the Lady Mules, Lizzie Marshall and Lindsey Stich, were quite sick the day before the match and head coach Courtney Patton admitted that they “had very little energy” the day of the game. While she didn’t want to use their illness as an excuse, it definitely couldn’t have helped their cause.

Finally on Oct. 7, they dropped a very tough match at Steele, a team they had beaten in five games at home in the first round and the current leader in the district standings. They won alternate games: 25-14, 11-25, 25-18, 21-25, before dropping the deciding game, 15-17, in a heartbreaker.

Suddenly the match against Seguin Friday gained quite a bit more importance than originally thought. The girls desperately needed a win to break the losing streak and get back on track.

They got it in three straight games: 25-20, 25-15 and 25-19. The monkey was off their back for the time being.

“Our team really came together this game,” said senior middle blocker Tori Wesevich. “We all knew how important it was for our goals and playoffs.”

Did the losing streak have an effect on the team’s psyche?

“Yeah, it did but I think we really learned from it.” Wesevich said. “We will be stronger because of it.”

Patton, who has honed this year’s team into a potential juggernaut, didn’t appear to that concerned about the mini-losing streak. She and the team are instead taking the matches one at a time and seeing what they need to do to improve every week.

“We just keep trying to get the kids to believe in each other and to believe in themselves and believe in their goals,” Patton said. “That’s really what the coaches and I have been focusing on with that ‘road trip’ we were on.”

“After watching some film and after watching some of the things that we did well and some of the things we struggled on, I think that the kids see that the opportunity is right there within their reach and all they need to do is to be able to finish,” Patton said. “That’s the team’s focus right now. Finishing the matches. Putting opponents away. Being able to finish a match and be steady and consistent, not being on a roller coaster ride like we’ve been on so many times this year.”

By press time, the Lady Mules will have played Kerrville Tivy on the road on Tuesday and then have a welcome open date on Friday.

Their next scheduled match will be a highly anticipated one at the Muledome Tuesday against New Braunfels Canyon.

Currently the girls are in third place in District 27-4A with a 25-8 season record and a 5-3 record in district play. The top four teams in the district qualify for the playoffs, so if the season ended today they would make the cut.