The girls volleyball team from Narooma High School punched above its weight at the Combined High Schools State Championship in Sydney.
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It was the first time a girls team from the school has qualified for the open school state volleyball championship.
The school's deputy principal Fiona Saunders said their achievement was all the more remarkable because the 11 Year 9 students only started playing together as a team in March this year.
"All of them do other sports as well so this is just something they have picked up at school and done very well," Ms Saunders said.
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Narooma High School and Nowra High School were the two South Coast teams that qualified to represent their region that extends from Wollongong to Eden and inland as far as Yass and Goulburn.
The Narooma team finished in the 13th spot in the open competition where many of the teams were a lot older and more experienced.
Learnt a lot at championship
To qualify for the state championship in Sydney they played three rounds of competition.
Firstly in March in Bega against local schools and then in Bomaderry in May where they played against schools from the entire South Coast region.
They returned to Bomaderry in July where there was a very close battle with the Nowra team and one from Wollongong.
In Sydney they played six games on July 19 and July 20.
They won three and lost three.
Ms Saunders said they learnt a lot over those two days.
"They are good players and they were learning about the psychological side of competition and soon picked it up.
"It is hard to teach them down here where there are no schools nearby to regularly play with," Ms Saunders said.
The girls said they had learnt to support each other during games to keep up their energy as a team.
They thanked their teachers, Ms Saunders and Claire Mathie, as well as the P&C for their support and helping with their travel and accommodation costs.
They also paid tribute to the school's boys team that really helped them build up their skills, particularly defence.
"We weren't afraid of the ball because they helped us as a team," they said.
They loved the vibe of the competition although they felt they went there as underdogs.
People asked them where they were from and when they said Narooma, the next question was where is Narooma.
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