SAN DIEGO — After starting the season 1-6, the San Diego Mojo have flipped the script.
On Sunday at Viejas Arena, the Mojo won their sixth of the last seven matches with a four-set victory over the Columbus Fury, 25 -13, 20 - 25, 25 - 20, 25 - 19. Now halfway through the season, San Diego sits at 7-7 and tied for third place after opening the year near the bottom of the standings.
“Really proud of the team effort,” said head coach Alisha Glass Childress. “It takes a lot of different people scoring in a lot of different areas. … I thought we maintained composure. After they got a set, we responded well with the changes that they made, and so really proud of coming on top, but also just staying in it together as a team.”
It was Mojo all the way in the first set. After dropping the opening point, San Diego ripped off a 12-3 run and never looked back. Five players recorded at least one kill. Jovana Brokocevic led with five, Maya Tabron added four, and Marin Grote controlled the net with four blocks. The Mojo hit efficiently and dominated defensively, finishing the set with a 6-0 advantage in blocks on the way to a 25-13 set win.
Columbus responded in the second, building a lead that grew to as many as ten points. San Diego chipped away but could not close the gap. The Mojo kill percentage dipped from 34 to 24 percent from the first to second set as Columbus evened the match.
The third set tested San Diego’s resolve. The Mojo trailed 10-6 before going on a 5-0 run to take an 11-10 lead. Later, with the score 19-18, San Diego closed on a 6-2 run to claim the set 25-20.
“This team has shown time and time again that they're not going to give up, and they're going to keep continuing to find solutions and rally behind each other,” said Childress. “We've been working a lot on taking risks and really going for it in moments, even if it's difficult or challenging. And so I thought, for example, Maya did a really nice job of just taking some big rips in big moments, and I think that led everybody to feel compelled to do that. And so I think it's really important for our growth as a team that we push the needle on that. …We're a good defensive team, and so that keeps us in rallies. If we can just finish some of those long rallies, then that's the way that we kind of scrap and claw back into the match. And I thought that's what we saw tonight.”
That composure showed again in the fourth. A 4-0 run gave the Mojo their first lead of the set at 12-10. Two separate 3-0 runs stretched the advantage to seven points at 21-14. The match ended fittingly on a kill from local Morgan Lewis, sending the home crowd out with another win.
Tabron led the way with 18 kills and 10 digs. Grote finished with 11 kills, while Brokocevic added nine. Setter Marlie Monserez, last week’s Major League Volleyball Player of the Week, recorded a double double with 28 assists and 14 digs. Shara Venegas, who leads the league in digs per set at 3.89, had 13 digs while Grace Loberg added 16 digs and made her presence felt across the back row.
The Mojo are exuberant after their 3-1 defeat of the Fury. Ryan Young/San Diego Mojo
First Seven to Now
The turnaround from the start of the season has been dramatic. From 1-6 to a record of 7-7 after winning six of their last seven, the Mojo have climbed into the thick of the playoff race.
Childress pointed to the second time the team played the Omaha Supernovas as a defining moment for the team. The Mojo lost their home opener to the Supernovas in three sets on Jan. 8. They lost two more matches, picked up their first win, then lost again before playing the Supernovas on Jan. 30. They lost that one, too, but this one went five sets, including a soul-crushing 21-19 fifth-set loss. And, although the team lost, she pointed to the closeness of the match that provided evidence to the team that they had already grown significantly since the first time the teams competed.
“We've broken the season up into quarters, and so the first quarter was a little rough, trying to figure out our voice and what how we're going to compete as a team,” said Childress. “I think this second quarter is really demonstrating the fruits of the labor that we put in all this work, and now we're able to see the results and also stay the course that we want to not just sit here. We want to continue to get better and better. So I think it's really important that we push ourselves right, that we don't kind of settle in, okay, we've had success in this quarter. We're going to coast through the next one, but really just see, hey, the more work we put in, the more we see results, the more we see ourselves become a better team, night in, night out. And so I think we continue that energy and momentum, and I think we're definitely a team to watch out for.”
Loberg said belief inside the locker room never wavered, even during the early losses.
“I think we all definitely imagined it was possible, and the belief stayed high,” said Loberg. “The coaches always said, this is where we're at right now, but we're continuing to get better every game. We don't need to try to do too much during a game, (just) play like we have been practicing and continue to show our growth. And so we've always had a super big growth mindset, which I think is helpful. Never do we let those early losses like get us down, because the season's long, we're going to see each of these teams multiple times, and we knew we were improving. And so I'm just happy to see that it's all showing now that our record’s seven and seven, and we're going to continue to move the needle and get better.”
Halfway through the season, the Mojo are no longer searching for their identity. They are building momentum, defending relentlessly, spreading the offense across the court, and proving that their early record did not define them.
Next Up:
The Mojo have another home matchup vs. the Atlanta Vibe on March 7 at 6 p.m. Purchase tickets here or watch on KUSI.
Top Photo: Maya Tabron with the kill. Ryan Young/San Diego Mojo
