Published: 12:16 AM, Tue Sep 07, 2010
Shank setting the pace for Britt's volleyball team
By Earl Vaughan Jr.
Scholastic sports editor
In football, it's the quarterback. In basketball, it's the point guard.
But if you're at a volleyball match and want to figure out who's running things and where the play is going, the player to watch is the setter, and few are better at it than Jack Britt's Sloane Shank.
Third-year Britt coach Krista Marrara has had plenty of time to watch Shank develop. She coached the Britt junior varsity before taking over as varsity coach. She and Shank have been together as coach and player for four years now.
"She's progressed amazingly over time,'' Marrara said. "She takes the initiative. She goes to camps on her own. Practices. She does the whole thing when no one is looking.''
It is Shank who runs the offense for the Buccaneer volleyball team. Other players funnel the ball to her, then Shank gets it to the hitters to close the play out.
"You get three touches per side,'' Marrara said. "The setter should get the second ball so we can get a kill out of it.''
Marrara said Shank brings some natural talents to her role that help make her even better.
"She has intelligence,'' Marrara said. "She's got quickness and team know-how. You tell her something and it clicks with her.''
That's a big part of the reason Shank has been captain of every one of Marrara's teams since her freshman year at Britt.
As good as she is at the sport, Shank got into it almost by accident. She first gave it a try in the eighth grade. The summer before, she visited a friend who attended a volleyball camp in Kansas and asked Shank if she wanted to come along.
She liked it, and the following year went out for the team at John Griffin Middle School. It was the team sports concept of volleyball that sold her.
"I work better with a team, being in a team environment,'' she said. "It kind of clicked with me.''
As a setter, Shank has to be aware of the whole court, know who the passers are that will get her the ball and then know where her hitters are and where they like the ball to be delivered.
"I talk to my hitters and try to listen to them if they tell me something I need to fix,'' Shank said. "I like to communicate with my team.''
Communication is not a big problem when you've got a core group of seven seniors who've been playing together for a long time like Britt has this year. "Some of us have been together since middle school,'' Shank said. "A lot of us have played travel ball together. Playing year round helps you get to know them better.''
Coming off a conference championship year with seven seniors back obviously makes the outlook at Britt for this season extremely bright. Even Marrara has to admit that.
But an early loss to a good Scotland team reminded the Buccaneers that winning isn't automatic.
"Just because we have seven seniors back doesn't mean we're going all the way,'' Marrara said.
But she's still setting the bar high for this year's team.
"We would like to get to the fourth round of the state playoffs, the regionals, something we've never been to,'' she said. "If we're going to do it, this is going to be the year.''
Scholastic sports editor Earl Vaughan Jr. can be reached at vaughane@fayobserver.com or 486-3519.