Graduation losses create opportunities for those who return

GILMAN VOLLEYBALL PREVIEW

It’s easy some years for high school sports followers to fall into the trap of focusing on what a team lost from the previous season. In the case of Gilman’s volleyball program, how wouldn’t you when the losses from 2022 include two college-bound, first-team All-Eastern Cloverbelt athletes in Gracie Tallier and Tatum Weir, a three-year starter and second-team All-ECC pick in Ellie Drier and another significant contributor in Tshiya Keepers.

But for those directly involved, roster turnover is just part of the process and part of what makes the start of each new season exciting.

“Right after the season, you’re thinking about who’s graduating and moving on and you’re thinking about how to prepare,” Gilman’s veteran head coach Janice Komanec said last week. “But even as you start summer activities, you see right away girls just mature that little bit and just become that much better. They come in and they just start to fill those spots. There are spots to fill, that’s for sure.”

The Pirates’ cupboard certainly isn’t bare. Gilman brings a half-dozen contributors back from last year’s varsity squad, led by All-ECC honorable mention setter Abby Chaplinski, and has more athletes trying to push their way into spots. By all accounts, the off-season was a productive one with high participation rates in league play, camps in Gilman and Stanley and the team’s annual scrimmage day with three other schools on July 27.

Now it’s time to see how the season starts to unfold for a Division 4 program that is having no trouble whatsoever with numbers as 28 girls showed up on day one, enough to create three teams.

“I feel like a lot of people showed up and did their job,” senior Bryn Hendricks said. “It wasn’t like ‘oh, it’s just summer.’ It was ‘we need to buckle down and play.’” “I think we learned a lot and found out what we need to work on,” senior Emilia Reid said.

Going into Wednesday’s season-opening triangular with Owen-Withee at Thorp, Komanec said she felt confident in the team’s outside hitting, its serving, its aggressiveness and its setters –– and there might be two setters this year.

The key position battle and unknown going into the season is going to be in the middle where Keepers and especially Weir, with her height, length and high hitting percentage, leave a pretty substantial void. “With our middles, we have people fighting for spots yet,” Komanec said. “I’ve been telling the girls the biggest thing for our middles is I need them to block. We lost two middles that went up (to block) every time. That was our strength last year was our presence at the net. That is going to be something we definitely have to strengthen this year. Tatum had the attack and the block. Tshiya wasn’t huge offensively for us but she was big defensively. That block was always present for us.”

The middle candidates are sophomore Allison Olynick, Reid and juniors Jaylyn Orth and Jaylen Copenhaver.

“With all of them, it’s either and/ or making themselves go every time or thinking they can,” Komanec said. “It’s them buckling down and doing it. I’ve made it very clear that if you go (to block) every time, right now you have the spot because that’s what we need.”

Offensively, Gilman has Chaplinski, who already has more than 1,000 career assists in two seasons, back as a setter, but Komanec said the Pirates are trying a 6-2 strategy this fall to get Chaplinski more involved as a hitter. She and returning senior Danielle Mann would rotate as the setters and leftside hitters. Junior Claire Drier and Hendricks are penciled in as the rightside hitters. Both have been in the varsity mix since they were freshmen.

“With our attack at the net, we have a lot of hitters,” Komanec said. “Obviously we have to buckle down on our passing and our defense. Our passing has to improve so we can use those hitters. But we have lots of options at our pins.

“Right now, we’ve been running with a 6-2 and we can be strong with that 6-2, but we can also be strong with a 5-1,” she added. “We are still trying to decide exactly which way we’re going to go, but the really exciting thing is that we could switch mid-match. If we’re not clicking one way, these girls will be ready to switch into that other mode. It might just be enough to change the momentum to allow us to get back into it.”

Ellie Drier had been Gilman’s rock in the back row, but now the Pirates feel they are just as solid with returning juniors Kayleigh James and Kenlyn Kroeplin. James has been working as the left back, switching from the middle.

“Kenlyn continues to improve just like Kayleigh does,” Komanec said. “Kenlyn is starting to take a pretty nice swing so we could also use her offensively if we needed to.”

Komanec said Drier has taken a nice jump and will likely be in all-around spots like Mann and Chaplinski. Sophomores Alison Krizan and Aubrey Steinbach round out the varsity roster. Krizan adds backrow depth and Steinbach actually will get most of her playing time as the JV setter. While Copenhaver is in the middle playingtime battle, she’s also a back-row candidate.

Last year’s Gilman squad had some outstanding serving production.

“Almost all of my servers can place,” she said. “Last year we took place serving to probably the highest level we’ve ever had. We were able to score a lot just by serve placement and having a whole team that could spot serve and that will continue.”

“Our serving has been really good,” Mann said.

“A lot of people are accurate with their spots and they can be consistent with their serves,” Hendricks said.

The seniors also like where the Pirates are defensively.

“I feel like we’re very good at coverage and knowing where we have to be,” Hendricks said. “People are willing to dive and sprawl out to just get the ball back up.”

“I feel like this is a team where most people can play the back row, not just front,” Mann said.

Komanec said diving and sprawling is great, but it’ll be more important for the girls to know who needs to do it when.

“Communication matters, but we just need to rep and really start to understand who’s ball is that, who should take it,” she said. “We have some speed and some girls who are not afraid to be on the floor.”

“Communication,” Mann said when asked what the Pirates will be most looking for in its early-season matches. “When we communicate, we’re 10 times better than when we don’t.”

“I think our communication this year has been some of the best and our positivity,” Reid said of the team’s first practices last week. “We all offer support to each other.”

After Wednesday’s neighborhood triangular, the Pirates will be tested at the annual Prentice Invitational on Saturday and with non-conference matches at Athens Aug. 31 and against Abbotsford in the Sept. 7 home opener. Conference play begins Sept. 12 against Colby. The Pirates were 4-3, good for a third-place tie with Colby and Loyal in last year’s Eastern Cloverbelt race. Columbus Catholic continued its dynasty in the ECC at 7-0 while Neillsville went 6-1. The key post-season development is perennial power McDonell Central bumped up to Division 3, leaving everyone else in the Division 4 bracket thinking this is their shot. “This is a great group of kids,” Komanec said. “There is a lot that last year’s seniors brought, part of that being the legacy of just play ball and have fun and let’s win together. It’s really what the feel is here. You can tell by the way they showed up all summer. They just want to play together, they want to compete together, they want to have fun together.”