Volleyball: Blue Jays using ‘underdog’ mindset to fuel success

JAMESTOWN, N.D. — The Jamestown Blue Jays entered the season with a lot of athletes needing to take on new roles. After winning their fourth WDA title a year ago, the Blue Jays lost a core of six seniors, leaving this year’s squad to fill some key positions. An opportunity that head coach Sara Hegerle enjoys.

“It’s a tough transition anytime you lose seniors to graduation,” she says. “We had a lot of contributing seniors last year, so McKenna was one of them and one of the best ever, I would say, coming through Jamestown High School. But, it’s fun to see new people step up in leadership and step up in roles that they possibly would have held last year had it not been for some of those seniors that got a chance to play. So, it’s always a nice puzzle that we put together and I love puzzles, so it’s a fun challenge.”

The key for Jamestown this season is their chemistry. The Blue Jays emphasizing the need to play together and love each other despite any differences.

“In a team meeting, we wrote on all of our love languages to help us know what we need to do for each other and all of us,” senior Edie Hegerle says. “It might not be the same for everyone, but that’s why we have that. So we know what each player likes and how to be encouraged.”

“I’m just going to be who I am, who God created me to be,” Hegerle adds. “You’re gonna have to take me for who I am, and that’s the same thing that we talk about with their kids. If we’re focusing on it and we’re focusing on the important intangible things that you can’t measure, you can’t look at a stat and say that’s why they’re successful. For us, it’s always been about playing together.”

As the season marches forward, Jamestown is getting stronger with a couple of players returning from injury. While you may think the rich are getting richer, the Blue Jays continue to play with an underdog mentality.

“I’m so excited to have them back because it hasn’t quite felt normal without Brooklyn and Hailey with us,” senior Leah Trumbauer says. “It’s something we’ve had to adapt to and we’ve done pretty well with it so far. I think all of us are just excited to have our usual starters back.”

“I feel like we’re the blue collar team that barely scraping by for wins, and then we’re always the underdog,” Hegerle adds. “I know that’s not the case, but I think that’s okay to feel that way. Like we have to scratch and fight for points and we want our kids to feel that we are undersized and understaffed, and all the things because I feel like we’re going to fight harder that way rather than the target on our back.”

Despite having less athletes on the roster compared to schools like Bismarck High and Century, Jamestown still finds success each year through a bond that starts at an early age.

“Nobody is expecting us to like being a bunch of teams, but it’s nice to just know that pressure’s kind of off us, so we can just play our game,” Hegerle says. “Just let people see that we do have potential and that we can just play our game.”

“I think it’s a gift,” Hegerle adds. “We are a unique situation in Jamestown because we don’t have the kids that come out, but we also know each other since the time we’re little. So, that can be a curse and it can be a blessing. We look at it as a blessing because we have played together for so long and we’re not coming from different middle schools and we’re not coming from different schools. So, they’re friends and teammates from the time they basically walk.”

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