Bravettes hungry, ready for Big Sky

By DIXIE KNUTSON/The Daily Inter Lake

Consistency is the name of the game for the Flathead Bravettes volleyball team.

The Bravettes (3-9, 4-14) are the No. 5 seed in the Western AA. They play No. 4 seed Missoula Big Sky (6-6, 10-12) at 6 tonight at Big Sky.

The winner advances to next weekend's State All-Class Volleyball Tournament in Bozeman. The loser sees the end of its season.

"I'm expecting Big Sky to be ready," said Flathead volleyball coach Leon Wilcox.

"They've been without Joslyn Tinkle for so much of the season … maybe there will be a little discontinuity there to help us find a crack. But for the most part, I think they're going to be coming out playing like a team that wants to go to state," he said.

"I think our girls are pretty hungry. They've got me convinced they're ready. They've had good practices this week. They've been playing hard. They want it and they believe they can do it.

"Everybody is healthy and hungry and we're looking forward to it.

"If we play our game, we'll do well. We just need to play our game consistently," he said.

Flathead has played Big Sky twice this season.

The first time, the Bravettes won the first game 25-10, then lost the next three. The second time, Flathead won the first two games, then dropped the next three.

"We get a team up against the ropes and then we let off," Wilcox said.

"At this point, you can't afford that. We've only got one shot left.

"We've got to keep pressure on the whole time.

"I told them to lose themselves in the game and leave it all on the floor," the coach said.

Among Big Sky's assets (in addition to the 6-foot-3 Tinkle) are 6-0 junior middle hitter Katie Showers, 5-10 outside hitter Lindsey Hall and 5-8 junior setter Sarah Lidstrom.

"If our blockers do their job, we'll be able to slow all their hitters down," Wilcox said.

"They don't recover well from hitting slumps, so that will be an important job for our blockers to try to disrupt their offense. We're going to count on them to stop a few at the net," he added.

Offensively, Flathead has been led in recent weeks by Hana Burton, Emma Miller and Ariel Johnson.

Miller hasn't played enough matches to be eligible for the Class AA statistics.

But "her blocking is tremendous," the coach said.

Johnson is averaging 2.6 kills per game, Burton 2.3 and Miller 2.1.

Burton is leading Western AA outside hitters in hitting efficiency (.272).