Despite some heavy losses to graduation and an injury to a key player that will sideline her for the season, Superior volleyball coach Kyra McElroy remains upbeat about this year’s team.

Gone from last year’s successful squad are Payton Milender, Maddy Drey, Brooke Bibler, Trinity Donaldson and Akasha Azure. All five, who were multi-sport standouts for the Lady Bobcats during their high school sports careers, graduated this past spring.

Another standout player, senior Lanie Crabb, will miss the volleyball season as she strives to overcome a knee injury that required surgery over the summer and will keep her out of the fall sports lineup.

“Lanie is out due to what has been a long on-going knee injury,” McElroy said. “She is still involved with the program and even though she can’t play, she enjoys coming to practice with her sister, Josie Crabb”.

Josie is among the list of returning players that fuels McElroy’s optimism that the traditionally strong Lady Bobcats will again be a team battling for league leadership.

“We have a lot of new faces this year and are very eager to get the season started,” she said. “We have some sophomore returnees from last year, including Maggie Haworth, who played right side last year, and Shaylie Smalley, our defensive specialist. We are also welcoming back junior middle blocker Braelynn Mangold (a distance runner in track), who was a huge asset for us last year. We also have a new face in Josie Crabb”.

McElroy said this year’s team, like teams in the past, is very energetic and wants to play some volleyball.

“This group is very energetic and willing to work hard,” McElroy said. “They have a positive mindset and despite being as young as we are, this group of players is very supportive of one another and push each other during practice”.

McElroy said one thing the team is working on is serve receive. She also cited the need to learn to play together and communicate better.

“We are still getting the gist of being a new team, with new communication. The girls haven’t spent a ton of time playing with each other, but I know that over time those things will come”.

The Lady Cats finished the 2022 season with a solid 16-10 season record and placed second in the district standings. They moved up to a new district and new classification this year, going from Class C competition to Class B.

“We are looking forward to facing all of our new opponents such as Mission, Thompson Falls and our not-so-new opponent, Plains,” she said.

The Lady Cats travel to St. Ignatius this Saturday to open their season at the Mission Invitational tourney. Their home opener is the following Thursday, August 31, with a match against Deer Lodge at 7 p.m.