Ruston volleyball team opens season tonight

Ruston High volleyball is set to begin the 2023 regular season tonight at 6 p.m. against Parkway, ready to face a year of changes head-on.

Between an interim head coach in Amanda Cauley and a temporary home court due to ongoing gym construction at the high school, the Bearcats will start the season embracing the newness around them, rather than using it as a crutch.

Cauley certainly won’t, and she’ll continue to hold her team to high standards – just how they want it to be.

She founded the Ruston volleyball program in 2014 and coached through the 2017 season before stepping down in 2018 to spend time with family, including her three daughters Harper, Baylor, and Josie. She led the program to a district title and playoff berths in her last three seasons.

Now, she’ll fill in for five-year head coach Lucie Hunt, who will miss the season due to ongoing health challenges.

But with familiarity with the roster from previous coaching duties, Cauley knows her group well enough to get the most of out of them.

“Fortunately, I’ve been with them since they started,” Cauley said. “I’ve had most of them six years ago at A.E. Phillips or at camps when they were little. So, I’ve worked with these girls before and they know that I believe in them and I’m here for them. They know I’m passionate about the game, so my message to them is I’m going to work hard for them, and I want them to work hard for each other.”

Ruston went 28-13 last season, losing in the second round of the Division I playoffs to eventual state champion Mt. Carmel.

It’s a loss that still hurts for the team, and Cauley hopes it continues to serve as fuel for the Bearcats to turn a year surrounded by uncertainty into a historic one.

“We do have big goals, and we keep talking about that,” Cauley said. “We want to work in the short term, but our goal is long term and our goal is we want to go to the state tournament. We want to go to Lafayette in November and be the team that does that for the first time. And so, I think for us to be that we need to stay healthy and what I keep telling them is, ‘We don’t have to peak now. We can peak in late October going into November.’” The Bearcats have five seniors, five juniors, one sophomore, and one freshman on varsity this season, led by returning starters Hannah Rollins, Harper Cauley, Jade Smith, and Allie Richardson.

Rollins, a Second Team All-District selection last season, is ready for her senior season to get underway.

“I’m really excited to see how the season’s going to go and how we’re going to work as a team and grow from the beginning,” Rollins said. “It set in for me the other day that this is our last season and that we need really need to work as hard as we can to get to our goal.”

Along with Rollins, fellow senior Jade Smith is back as one of the top offensive threats for the Bearcats after being named District 2-1 Offensive Player of the Year with 231 kills and 78 blocks last season.

Smith has enjoyed the extra scrimmage work the Bearcats got in the offseason and is confident the team can reach its potential by season’s end, particularly in teaching the underclassmen behind her.

“With the underclassmen, I try to watch and tell them what to fix or help them through it,” Smith said. “I don’t want them to mess up in silence when they know they need help. Because I didn’t have that when I was a freshman. My freshman year was the COVID year, and I didn’t have any that, so I want to give that to them.”

Ruston High’s varsity volleyball roster includes Shelby Freeman (senior), Allie Richardson (senior), Hannah Rollins (senior), Jade Smith (senior), Cala Wilson (senior), Rilee Atwood ( junior), Harper Cauley ( junior), Ellie Koonce ( junior), Katelyn Rollins ( junior), Mariah White ( junior), Kyndall Fobbs (sophomore), and Baylor Cauley (freshman).

Ruston takes on Parkway tonight at 6 p.m. at the Ruston Sports Complex.