Chantal Rivera is a student journalist at the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism at Arizona State University assigned to cover South Mountain High School volleyball.

The South Mountain Jaguars faced Betty H. Fairfax Stampede in a raucous match on Monday.

But before the game, it was easy to appreciate the Lady Jags warming up. Some of the girls were dancing, others just doing their routine drills, but all with the same mentality: to take the Fairfax squad down.

There was something special about this match. South Mountain coach Paula Spratlen-Mitchell referred to this game as the “neighborhood match.” The crowd was wild for both teams, and the Lady Jags knew they needed to focus on the game, leaving the cheers outside the court on the side.

“Before the game, we thought about what we need it to do, how we needed to be strategic and how we needed to take the crowd out of the map, so they weren’t the extra man on the court,” Spratlen-Mitchell said.

The Jaguars’ confidence, energy and motivation were the perfect mix to take the triumph home and defeat the Stampede 3-0. The set scores were 25-22, 25-12, and 25-9.

Each one of the girls exerted tremendous efforts and went out of her comfort zone throughout each set to take the win home. The Jaguars middle blocker, Adriana Perea, was one of the noticeable players who came out of her shell and defended the squad in every set she was in. Perea just started her new position as middle blocker a couple of weeks ago, and this game was definitely a challenge she overcome.

“At first, I was very scared because this position is new for me,” Perea said. “I like to listen to inspirational speeches and just tell myself that I got this and that I can do it.”

Coach Spratlen-Mitchell also mentioned the change Perea had Monday.

“She was aggressive, she was disciplined, and she was alert,” Spratlen-Mitchell said. "It was just nice to see her prove to herself that she can do it.”

Kamri Radden, the team captain, was the other start of the night. The loud crowd only gave her more reasons to create magic and bring fire to the court.

“I love it. The more people, the better because we feed off that energy,” Radden said. “I’m just used to blocking out noise.”

There was tension, noise and heat from both teams inside the gymnasium throughout the entire game. Although some girls can be better at blocking the outside noise, some of them were tense and needed a reminder from coach Spratlen-Mitchell to relax.

“I didn’t want them to play uptight, and I didn’t want them to play not to lose, but to win the game,” Spratlen-Mitchell said. “I want them to relax and be confident in what they are doing, because I know that they are well prepared to do what needs to be done when it needs to be done.”

The intense trajectory of each of the sets only gave the squad more reasons to celebrate its victory at the end of the night and prepare for their next match. The Lady Jags will take a one-day break and come back to face the Central Bobcats on Wednesday in another away match.