Scouting the area - Volleyball preview from the Osakis Review

(Note: Volleyball and football season previews for the Jaguars can be found in this week's Sauk Herald, Observer, and Bonanza Valley Voice newspapers.)

"Osakis volleyball takes court Tuesday"
By: By Eric Morken, Sports reporter, The Osakis Review

The Osakis volleyball team looks to continue its dominance of the Prairie Conference with a roster loaded with upperclassmen in the 2009 season.

The Silverstreaks have 10 seniors who are hoping to lead the way for Osakis after finishing 2008 with a 19-8-1 overall record. Included in that was their second straight Prairie Conference championship that was won in style with a perfect 10-0 league record. It was the second consecutive year that the Silverstreaks went through the conference schedule undefeated. It is a feat that head coach Kirsten Wessel feels stems from the way the girls are taught at a younger age.

“I would say that we just keep pushing our younger girls to get better,” she said. “We keep improving our younger grades. As we continue to push them, each year our incoming varsity players are at a high level. I do a little spikers program with our 4th, 5th and 6th graders. It sparks interest and with that interest, we have got a large number of girls to go out.”

That 20-0 conference record in the last two seasons makes Osakis the team to beat until another team proves otherwise. Upsala and Browerville both look to be the teams that could pose the biggest threat to the Silverstreaks. Upsala finished 13-9-1 last year. Browerville ended 14-13 after losing to Osakis in the Section 5A playoffs.

“You don’t want to overlook anybody,” Wessel said. “I don’t want the girls to feel too comfortable in that, ‘yeah, we are winning the conference.’ We need to continue to work hard. Upsala and Browerville always have pretty decent teams, and you can’t let up on a team like that.”

If the Silverstreaks do repeat as conference champions, they will have to make up for the loss of three all-conference players. Prairie Conference defensive MVP Whitney Lee, Stacey Kern and Kari Ludwig all graduated last year. Tricia Hetland was also lost to graduation after an honorable mention all-conference season.

On another note...my album containing over 250 photos from Saturday's state tournament game between Elrosa and Cannon Falls has been fully uploaded to the Sauk Centre Herald's online photo gallery. The URL is = saukherald.mycapture.com