Haikyu! Episode 12 Review

I'm back and finally at it again, continuing my anime watching and review of Haikyu! I have missed this anime for a few weeks and I'm behind and I plan to do reviews of all of them as quickly as I can in order to catch up.

So, finally, the Miyagi Spring Tournament has begun, and the Karasuno team plays their first round in the qualifiers. They play against Ougi Minami. Naturally, with all that hard training and practice from that bootcamp that Karasuno had with all those advanced teams, Karasuno had no trouble.

Karasuno WRECKED Ougi Minami! Okay, maybe not "wrecked" since they seem have put up a bit of a fight, considering that Ougi Minami did make it into double digits, but either way they lost and it looked like Karasuno was straight-up kicking their ass.

Miyagi Spring Tournament Score Check

Karasuno vs. Ougi Minami (2:0 / 25-16, 25-13)

The match started off with an ace serve from Asahi. When a game starts off with an ace serve, you already know that the match is going one way. The momentum was already given to Karasuno and Ougi Minami had no way of getting back. Karasuno was clean and perfecct. Daichi picked up a hitter's tip as if it were nothing, Hinata was hitting his famous "crazy quicks" with perfection and no blockers could commit to him, all in all, Karasuno was looking great.

Now, some words about Ougi Minami. They are the kind of team that I hate the most. They actually remind me a little bit of my team. When they really feel down, they kinda just give up a bit. THERE IS NOTHING I HATE MORE THAN THAT! The game isn't over until the ball hits the ground. We saw during the flashback that Towada gives up on saving the ball, and now former member, Akimiya, runs after the ball to get it up, but fails to do so, ending the game. Towada remembering the words and the actions of his old captain transforms into a better player, a stronger one and goes after the ball before it can hit the ground. Although they still lost, Ougi Minami has gained something from this. 

A fighting spirit.

They gained the frustration that every volleyball player feels and they will be able to carry that over and become a much stronger team. I think this is what is important from this episode. Even though you put all your effort into making something happen and you fail, don't just give up and forget that frustration you feel. That frustration will be your strength and become the catalyst for you to move forward and become stronger for the next time around.

This was a pretty normal episode. Not too different or exciting really, but it was normal, average. Hopefully, the matches get more hyped as the Spring Tournament continues and we'll see how well Karasuno does against their next opponent, Kakugawa