By ALEC ETHEREDGE | Sports Editor

NORTH SHELBY – After opening the 2018 season with a special 3-0 sweep of Calera in the new Warrior Arena, the Thompson Warriors Volleyball team was back at it over the weekend of Aug. 24, winning the 2018 Oak Mountain Volleyball tournament.

Just a day after the historic win, the Warriors kicked off the tournament in bracket play with two games on Friday, Aug. 24, starting with Shades Valley.

In that first matchup, Thompson was able to carry over momentum from its opening-night win, and swept two more sets from Shades Valley for a 2-0 (25-20, 25-14) win to start the tournament.

It got even better in the second matchup of the night for the Warriors, as they went on sweep two more sets from The Altamont School by finals of 25-14 and 25-9.

That put THS at a perfect 7-0 through two nights of the 2018 season, showing why they are considered one of the favorites in the 7A classification this season.

The following morning, after starting 2-0, Thompson got back on the court for one more pool-play matchup looking to be the winner of Pool A to grab a No. 1 seed.

Instead, the Warriors ran into a tough Hartselle team leading to a stellar three-set match.

Thompson came out of the gates flying with a 25-19 win in the first set, as they still seemed unbeatable to start the season, but that quickly changed in the second set.

For the first time, the Warriors faced some adversity when they dropped a tough two-point set to Hartselle that went beyond the allotted 25 points necessary with Hartselle taking the set 27-25 to win by two.

It was the first set the Warriors had dropped in eight through the season, and it ended up being the first of two in a row by two points.

In the third set, played to 15 points, it was another tightly contested game, but Hartselle snuck out the final two points to win 15-13 and claim the No. 1 seed out of Pool A.

That led to a matchup with senior-lade Helena, the No. 1 seed out of Pool B, in the semifinals of the tournament.

The first set of that match was tightly contested, with the Warriors winning a close one 26-24, but Thompson got back to its dominant ways in the second set winning 25-11 to pull off another sweep and advance to the championship.

In the championship match, THS was set to face the host Oak Mountain Eagles, and an almost identical match to the semifinal match ensued.

The first round of the championship matchup went to extra points thanks to a late tie, but Thompson eventually pulled out the 29-27 win to start the title game 1-0.

Just like the matchup with Helena, that spurred a lot of momentum for the Warriors, who came back and dominated the second set by a final score of 25-12 against the Eagles to claim the championship.

Through six matches this season, Thompson is now 5-1 with a tournament championship and has dropped just two sets.