3 teams secure semis berths in Rocball

Three semis seats in the 2011 Rocball Fall League have been filled after last week’s games at the Marianas High School Gymnasium.

Making it to the Final Four are Aim Low, Roc-It, and the Teachers, which share similar 3-1 records for a tie for first place. Give-a-Hoot, Just-do-It, and Alpha Q, which hold identical 1-3 card, will battle for the last semis ticket with the winner of the contested slot to be determined at the end of this week as three more games are left to be played in the second round.

Incidentally, the three squads gunning for the remaining semis berth are scheduled to face the Top 3 teams in the field. Aim Low is set to duel Alpha Q, Roc-It is slated to challenge Just-do-It, and Give-a-Hoot is scheduled to meet the Teacher. Victories against the top-ranked teams will boost the lower three teams’ chances to the next round, which will be a best-of-three affair. The No. 1 team will square off against the No. 4 squad in the semis series, while the No. 2 and 3 finishers after this week’s games will have their own semis duel.

Roc-It sealed a Final Four berth after whipping Give-a-Hoot last week. Roc-It “scunk” Give-a-Hoot in the first set and swept the last two sets for the easy victory. A set victory via “scunk” is given to the team that held its foe scoreless. After neutralizing Give-a-Hoot in the first set, Roc-It managed to limit the latter to seven points throughout the match. Toni Yamada led Roc-It’s domination of Give-a-Hoot, converting points off her consistent service game.

In other results last week, Alpha Q broke into the win column in the second round after surviving Just-do-It in double overtime. Alpha Q took the first two sets, but failed to juice out Just-do-It after losing the third set. In Rocball, a team that leads the game after three sets can only get the win if it also prevails in the third set. If the trailing squad wins the third set, the game goes in overtime or o-kon. In o-kon, the leading team must win only once to finish the game, while the trailing squad must take two sets.

Just-do-It went on to extend the game to another set after drawing a goal from John Santy. In overtime, the team to score a goal first automatically gets the set win regardless of the scores. In the deciding second set, it was Alpha Q’s turn to end the match outright, as John Kileleman scored his lone goal in the game.