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Women at Work: Plenty for West to accomplish in early stages of practice
BY Kevin Hageland, khageland@starlocalnews.com
Volleyball teams started practice Monday and there isn't much time to waste with most teams beginning the regular season just eight days later.
But starting practice doesn't mean immediately game planning for matches.
"There are so many things you have to get done," said Brittany Bridge, Plano West head coach. "You have to distribute and collect UIL eligibility forms, submit rosters to the various tournaments and send out the sizes you need for t-shirts and warm-up gear. And think about it, to do all those things you have to already have your entire team picked out."
The Lady Wolves have eight returners from last season as well as girls coming up from JV, but still had holes to fill, which is where the 97 girls coming in Monday and Tuesday to tryout from Jasper and Shepton High School came in handy.
"We've got the base of our team set up ahead of time," Bridge said. "But maybe you need a girl on the right side or maybe you need a girl on defense, so you will look at girl X, Y, Z and pit them against one another in drills to see who talks the most on the court, who moves the best and then decide which ones could best help your team."
Once that process was completed, the actual practices could begin.
"We've been working real hard already," said Shane Peters, senior defensive specialist, "which is what has to happen because we all have a lot to improve on."
Senior outside/right side hitter Katie Stebbins concurred with that assertion.
"I think everyone knows we have to step it up in practice," she said. "And I think we have so far."
That is key given how fast certain choices will be made.
"You really have to look at the potential lineups and rotations and make some decisions quickly," Bridge said.
To aid in that cause, the Lady Wolves employ a variety of drills in practice.
There are unique exercises, such as the dig drill in which West puts a player (on Thursday it was senior middle blockers Julia DeVinney and Paige McKiddy) on top of two 3- to 4-foot boxes placed just inside the antennas to hit balls down at the defenders on the other side of the net. But there are also the more standard drills, such as an extended run through serve receive.
"That is an important one for us," Bridge said. "We need to see who we can pull back for serve receive because our frontline players are going to have to do that."
Blocking drills are also a big player in West practices, which makes sense given that many of the girls work in different blocking schemes in club ball than the ones the Lady Wolves use.
"We have a lot of skill-based drills," Stebbins said. "Which usually means balls being thrown a million miles an hour at you continuously."
That is a necessary part of determining decisions and strategies for the season, which opens Tuesday with West on the road against South Grand Prairie.
"You want to see what the new players can do and figure out what our side out plays are going to be," Bridge said. "You also want to determine who plays well together. You may have a girl that is great individually, but maybe the team doesn't gel well around her."
West has had to make some of those decisions shorthanded.
Senior setter Brooke Coleman has been the primary distributor in practice with one setter out due to a death in the family and presumptive starting senior Abigail Curry in London for the Olympics.
"Brooke has been doing a really great job so far in practice," Peters said.
The increased reps have forced Coleman to work hard this week, but that's a sentiment all her teammates can sympathize with.
"Two-a-days are two-a-days," Stebbins said during the break before the team's second practice of the day. "Sometimes you get to a point where you think, 'man, I just want to sit down,' but you have to keep pushing if you want to get better. And there is plenty of time for rest in the evening."
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