BROWNSTOWN
When Brownstown Central’s Richayla Huff took to the floor, the team felt most confident in their abilities.
Huff’s efforts on the 2016 season earned her a handful of awards at the volleyball team’s awards program on Monday.
The senior was named Academic All-State, Most Valuable Player, the team’s assist leader and mental attitude award winner.
Huff also made All-Mid Southern Conference first team along with sophomore teammate Brooklyn Snodgrass.
Snodgrass, who was also the outstanding defensive player, received an even bigger honor later in the evening: first team All-State for Class 3A.
BCHS freshman Keeli Darlage was named All-MSC honorable mention and the leading hitter.
Senior Leah Stidam received the leading server award while freshman Ashley Schroer got the blocking award.
Huff and Stidam were both invited to try out for a senior All-Star team.
Huff, fellow senior Brooke Meyer and junior Grace Jaynes took home letter jackets.
Varsity finished 12-22 on the season against a very tough schedule.
Three of their losses came to teams that recently played in the state tournament.
“As the season progressed, we were taking losses we didn’t want to take,” Braves coach Jennifer Shade said. “What I had to explain to the girls is that we play one of the toughest schedules in the state. When we started coaching here, we were having undefeated seasons but didn’t feel prepared for the postseason. So, we strengthened our schedule.”
Shade said that the team progressively got better during the season, and even though it was a loss, their best match was against Providence in sectional.
“We talked to the girls about how we can’t measure the success we had with our season by wins and losses,” she said. “If we did that, then some of the greatest years I’ve coached here would be disappointments. All I wanted to know is that we had improvement and fought some of these very good teams.”
Prior to the varsity program, the junior varsity and C team members were honored.
The JV team finished 19-1, the best record in coach Cassidy Wurtzburger’s six years of coaching.
The junior varsity’s lone award went to freshman Emily Koch, the team’s most improved player.
Abbi Young, in her first year as head coach, helped lead the C team to a perfect 13-0 record.