Everyone has heard the saying "life is a rollercoaster". I don't know about you, but I personally love roller coasters. I love the suspense of ticking up that huge slope, not knowing when you are going to free fall onto the other side, and the way your stomach drops on the first flip or fall. Life has got its ups and downs and as athletes, we experience them in hyper speed. This week we had adrenaline-rushing highs and gut-dropping lows. 

Our lives started to mellow out after we got back from Cali, but it was not an easy process! Many of our girls had tests and projects due when we returned. Thankfully, we feel caught up. FOR NOW. Practice Tuesday was difficult getting our legs moving from the long plane rides, but the excitement of our first home match arriving the next day kept us going! After anxiously climbing that slope, we reached our peak of excitement Monday at 7 o'clock in the Holt Fieldhouse. It was game time! Our first home match was against Converse. Throw us in California, and we will play like nothing has changed. Place us in our first home match and we are nervous as all get out! Speaking from only one point of view, the first few points were a blur. But once we found our mojo, there was no turning back. After we won the first 2 sets, we headed down to the locker room for a 10 minute break. The intermission is to prepare us for the post-season tournaments because that's how it's done in the NCAA tournament. So if you are watching at home, or sitting cozy in our stands, please stay with us through those commercial breaks! We are keeping our eyes on the prize people! Another addition you might have noticed is holding our talons up when they announce our starting lineup. Do us a favor and throw up your talons too to show your supportJ. After the intermission we arose from the locker room with a mission to beat our opponent in three. And we did! It was a great team effort. And totally worth keeping our eyes open for when we sat at the top of that rollercoaster. 

The next day we celebrated Kristin's 21^st birthday by going to Pachangas which is a Mexican restaurant on the water of the Cherokee Dam. It was a nice little break in our week as we all bonded over chips, salsa, and trying to decide if the waiter was speaking English. 

Friday our new hero was crowned after a grueling battle over the past two weeks! Taylor Lowe came out victorious, and will be wearing our exclusively designed practice shirt until she is dethroned. 

From the beginning I told you this blog would have the pits and peaks of our lives here at Carson-Newman. Saturday was one of those pits. We left campus at 5:30 a.m. and arrived in Augusta, Ga. for our first match at noon. We played the University of North Carolina Pembroke, winning the first two and losing the next three.  There was just something missing. And before we knew it we were warming up for our second match of the day against GRU Augusta, and let that one slip through our hands too. None of us expected to lose both our matches that day, but maybe that's why we did.

After we arrived back at the Newman we were all expecting coach to lecture us on how we drove all the way to Georgia to lose two matches, but instead he explained to us that today we weren't our selves. We did not show up mentally or physically, but whatever team played in that gym is going to stay there and we are going to continue on as the fighting Eagles we know we are and the great team we have become. He threw out the game film that would normally be analyzed and we all decided to leave that behind us. And it's good we experienced this before we got into conference play, because now we can focus on the true enemies. Tusculum on Tuesday! 

We ended the week on a positive note with a yoga stretch session on Sunday. As we recovered our bodies from the soreness the past week had done and prepared it for the week to come, it's like we were coming to a slow halt on this ride. We collected our things and evacuated the carts with the understanding that we were only exiting to mount a totally new ride with the excitements of the week to come. 

I didn't realize I do this on every blog, but I want to give a shout out to our bus full of supporters that rode with us to Georgia, you all were the loudest people there and brought you're A-game. Thanks for picking us up and being the best fans out there! You really set the standard at our home matches too. And a little side note: Both of our middles, Kiayna and Jenna, did a headstand for the first time on Sunday!!!  Headstands take core, shoulder strength, balance, and lots of focus to get those legs all the way up! 

With the climbs and falls, flips and twists of the week, we all screamed and laughed together. In the end, the important thing is who is riding along with you. We all climbed in and out of our carts as a unit, and know we have your support through it all. It's like you are the seatbelts and harnesses of our journey, but if I get into all of that we will have a repeat of last week with three pages of reading and nobody wants that! Hands up everybody! Lets enjoy this week's ride together. 

Thanks for reading,

Kristina (Tina) Hill

God Bless!

Throughout the 2014 volleyball season, junior libero Kristina Hill (Lake Orion, Mich.) will write about her experiences at Carson-Newman. A new installment will be released each Monday afternoon.

- CN -