Sounds that are normal in high school gyms this time of year meant more over the last two days.
Balls smacking off the hands of opposing hitters looking for the big kill. Cheers and chants from benches on each side after they score. Even whistles signifying the start and end of a point.
After a week filled with cleanup from Hurricane Isaias and the stress of finding a way to return to the court, area volleyball teams got to just play. Despite Escambia County Public Schools and Santa Rosa County District Schools both closing all week, they were able to get an exception from the FHSAA to play district tournaments.
"It was just a quick reminder at the end of the day, we're lucky to be out here," Gulf Breeze head coach Steven Clay said. "Sometimes it just takes a storm to remind us that the important stuff is not here. We're lucky to play volleyball and just grateful to be back out here."
Safety first, then schedules
At the start of the week, coaches were just checking in on athletes to make sure everyone was safe and accounted for. Milton woke up on Saturday morning to pictures of their gym filled with water. Navarre had players evacuate. Gulf Breeze junior Sophia Frantz had a pine tree fall through the roof and into her bedroom while she was away in Tuscaloosa, Alabama for the weekend.
While Santa Rosa County saw more damage, nearly more than 190,000 Florida Power & Light customers across both counties lost power.
Yet even as everyone assessed the damage, players were clear. They wanted to play.
"Some of them still didn't have power, but they didn't care," Pensacola head coach Rachel Trahan said. "They just wanted to play."
But kids wanting to play was never going to be the main issue. It was trying to make everything work across multiple counties and multiple school districts. When Hurricane Michael roared through the panhandle around this time in 2018, the FHSAA didn't carve out exceptions for teams in hard-hit areas to play in district tournaments.
This time, they extended the deadline from Oct. 16 to Oct. 17 and even pushed back the bracket selection show to Oct. 18. Then came the real work. No district featuring Pensacola area teams just features teams from Escambia and Santa Rosa County.
District 1-6A, District 1-5A, District 1-4A, District 1-3A and Rural District 1 all features teams from Okaloosa County, which went back to school on Thursday, Oct. 15. District 1-3A has two teams from Walton County, who went back to school on Wendesday, Oct. 14. Pensacola Catholic, who operates under the Diocese of Pensacola-Tallahassee, reopened on Thursday
L.E.A.D. Academy plays in District 1-1A and is the only team in the district between the state line and Tallahassee and initially forfeited its district quarterfinal against St. John Paul II before beating the Panthers on Wednesday and falling to Community Christian in the district semifinals.
It wasn't just as simple as moving initial schedules back a day or two. Every single district tournament had to be compressed. Two of the seven involving area teams were played in the same day. Two more involved doubleheaders and one a tripleheader, with several schools having to give up home matches just to get district tournaments in.
All this was figured out in a matter of days as teams had to make sure there gyms were okay while also dealing with new school closures.
"It wasn't confirmed until Tuesday evening that we were going to be playing Thursday," Navarre coach Sloane FitzHenry said. "48 hours later, that turnaround was pretty strenuously mentally for those who don't have water, haven't gotten power, haven't been in school a while."
How teams prepared to return to court
Once schools knew they were playing, they did the best they can trying to figure out how to practice. Navarre was unable to before Thursday, so FitzHenry tried to have her players stay mentally sharp, visualizing goals and what they wanted to accomplish.
For Milton, Gulf Breeze and Pace offered to use their gym, with head coach Chris Pickens opting for the closer school in Pace. Pensacola Catholic practiced Tuesday despite not having any water at the school.
All just to return for a purpose. For Gulf Breeze and Pensacola Catholic, who advanced to district title games on Saturday by sweeping Milton and Pensacola, respectively, it was a start to what the area's two top teams this fall hope will be long postseason runs. The state playoffs begin Tuesday, Oct. 20.
For Navarre, it was a chance to make history with its first volleyball district title and give seniors a proper Senior Night. For other it was a chance to end the season on their own terms, wrapping up this chapter which took an unexpected twist in the final pages.
Pickens still hasn't been to Milton since the storm and will return tomorrow to see if any of the volleyball equipment is salvageable. The future with the Panthers gym is still up in the air. But at least his team, like others throughout the area, got to determine their present while the recovery and cleanup continues.
"The devastation that has transpired there, it's bad," Pickens said. "Like I said, with most of these kids, some of them not still having power and all that stuff, kudos to them for even thinking about wanting to play volleyball."
This article originally appeared on Pensacola News Journal: How Pensacola area volleyball teams returned after Hurricane Isaias