About halfway through the 2026-2027 girls’ volleyball season, Westmont’s varsity team has had a bit of a rocky start. Despite this, the team continues to battle through every game under the coaching of Russell Davis. I am joined by this year’s captains seniors Orion Chang and Melissa Pasic to receive insight on the progress of their team and where they hope to go next.
Questions:
- Goals for this year? As a team and individually
- What’s your favorite part of being on this team?
- What’s the hardest part?
- What’s been the most memorable game of your high school career?
- How would you describe the vibe of your team?
- Do you have any pre-game rituals or traditions?
- Who on your team is the best at keeping everyone’s energy up?
- Thoughts on how the season has been going and where you hope to go next?
Orion Chang:
- Team: Make it to CCS Individual: Have a fun last season and win senior night
- My favorite part about being on this team is the bonds I make with the other players. After every point, we gather together in support to celebrate the wins.
- Coming back after we lose multiple points in a row. It’s easy to get stuck in our heads and it’s harder to get out.
- My first senior night as a freshman.
- Energetic and fun.
- I listen to the playlist I made in freshman year while stretching in the corner.
- Annalee Dang
- Although we had our losses, we bounced back and beat the 1st seed in our league. I hope that this confidence will carry through the entire season so we can win CCS!
Melissa Pasic:
- Our goal for this Volleyball season is to go 7-3 in league and make it to CCS. Individually, my goal for this year is to get either senior of the year or 1st all-league team and to be a good captain for my team and to help us win.
- My favorite part about being on this team is when varsity and jv get together to make posters for themed games, we play music, have potlucks, joke around, and then we have to clean up the mess we made on the floor to not get in trouble. All this makes it my favorite part about being on the team because we all have a good connection together and everything makes it memorable.
- The hardest part is losing a very close 5-set match because we play for so long and put so much effort into losing at the very end.
- The most memorable game of my high school career was either in my sophomore year when we played in the championship game at the Half Moon Bay tournament and we won a golden pumpkin, or another game my sophomore year when we beat the 1st place team in league in 3 sets and I got a huge block on a Division 1 commit.
- Our team is very goofy, funny, and loud.
- I have to take a pre-game immunity wellness shot with my teammate Natasha Curyea, listen to “Still Sleepless”, and then I also have to say a prayer and put my necklace with another prayer onto the side of my backpack.
- I think Annalee Dang has the best energy to keep everyone’s energy up because she encourages everyone when we aren’t playing well, and she’s also one of the loudest cheerers, which helps because we need people to be loud.
- I think so far our season has been good; we’ve played a lot of five-set matches and lost a couple, but we still put in a lot of effort into those games. We also just beat the 1st team in the league and we are hoping to win the rest of our games and the tournament to qualify for CCS.