Kamiakin volleyball has become accustomed to winning. Five straight Mid-Columbia Conference championships have made that clear.
However, head coach Morgan Schauble doesn’t want the Braves to just bask in the glory. She wants her powerhouse team to keep fighting – not only to meet the expectations the Braves have set for themselves every season, but because she knows they can exceed those expectations.
“Every single year, it’s always technically the goal, but we know that we have to defend it every single season and every single season is a new season…we still have to fight for that every year,” Schauble said on The Sports Council.
Kamiakin may dominate the Tri-Cities area, but it has yet to prove it can dominate the state tournament.
For the Braves, securing state hardware will require more than the talent that has produced five consecutive MCC championships. It will require the mental toughness to respond when matches don’t go according to plan.
Schauble said the team has been working on those moments in practice, putting her athletes in situations where they have to fight back rather than let a mistake dictate the outcome.
“We replicate those situations at practice,” Schauble said. “We’re not going to let a ball drop anymore at practice without any effort.”
They got an opportunity to test that mentality against Richland in their first match of the season.
Kamiakin won the opening set but dropped the next two, putting the Braves in a position where they had to battle to keep the match alive. They responded by taking the fourth and fifth sets.
“We were down the next two sets and had to overcome that fourth and fifth set. So, again, going back to our goals, being relentless on defense, being intense, and I felt like we did that at the very end,” Schauble said.
The comeback gave the Braves an early example of the resilience Schauble has been emphasizing.
Even with a winning record, Kamiakin’s success has been about more than what shows up in the win column. What makes the Braves an especially strong and special team is the connection between their players.
Eight seniors have played together for years, creating a bond that extends beyond the court.
For senior middle and captain Delaney Donaldson, that connection gives the team another reason to fight when a match gets difficult.
“It’s so much easier to play for people that you love and work harder for people that you love,” Donaldson said. “So, I think that is what helps the most is I want to play harder for those people that I love.”
That bond — which also comes from knowing each other since childhood and living in a tight-knit community — is something the team has embraced as “sisterhood.”
The girls know each other well enough to push one another, give each other a hard time and, when necessary, pick each other up.
“We can give each other a little bit of a hard time, but we always come out of it better for it,” outside hitter and captain Alexa Bilodeau said. “We push each other around, but then we get back up and we help each other up.”
A team with this much chemistry has to come with some personality, and Schauble describes them as intense, competitive and relentless.
The Braves are not exactly quiet about it.
“We’re very loud. We have a lot of personalities on our team and we’re actually insane if you really think about it,” Donaldson said.
For Schauble, that energy and mix of characters is what makes this group so special.
Donaldson brings spirit and helps connect the players, while Bilodeau keeps the team in check and boosts morale when needed.
Now, with a 14-1 record and another MCC title within reach, Kamiakin has already shown that it can continue to win. The next challenge is proving that the same toughness and chemistry that have carried the Braves through this successful season can carry them to the state podium.
For the eight seniors, it is a final opportunity to chase what has been missing from an already impressive high school career.
Five conference championships have established Kamiakin as one of the Tri-Cities’ top teams.
Now, the Braves want to see that success go beyond the MCC.
This week, the Braves will play at Hanford on Oct. 20 before returning home to face Richland on Oct. 22. With postseason play approaching, every match becomes an opportunity to build on what has already been accomplished as the stakes get higher.