After 29 years, the volleyball coaching career of Gordie Richardson has come to a close.
The Clarkston volleyball team, which had been peaking in the second half of the season, never could get untracked against Mason in regional action March 8 at Lansing Eastern, losing to the Bulldogs 15-11, 15-5. The loss ended Clarkston’s season with a record of 30-16-2.
Senior Megan Gaines was 29-of-30 setting with 16 aces and led the team with 10 digs. Sophomore Stephanie Parkin led the team with five kills and was eight-of nine serving, while junior Ashley Hudson was 13-of-14 serving with four kills and seven digs.
Richardson wished the season could have ended a little differently.
“I was a little disappointed,” he said. “I was pretty optimistic about how we had performed going into the regionals. We didn’t bring our ‘A’ game that day. Mason has a good offensive team and showed us multiple attacks.”
However, the loss did not diminish the improvement the team made in the latter part of the campaign, according to Richardson.
“Except for that last match, the second half of our season was outstanding,” he said. “The kids made such tremendous improvement. You could see the kids getting better and it was an exciting thing to watch.”
Richardson said he only briefly to reflect on the fact it was his last match as Clarkston’s volleyball coach.
“The first thing I thought of was it’s the last one,” he said. “The second thing was it’s time to go on to something else. After the match Saturday, I told the kids I was pleased the last team I coached was one that worked so hard and came together as the season went on.”