The 2006 Mount Si Wildcats girls’ volleyball team is looking for improvement. Coming off a 9-8 season in 2005, which started out well enough at 8-3 but ended in disaster as the team went 1-5 down the stretch, the team is a young one, but it has experience.

Returning as coach for her seventh season at the helm of the Wildcats is Bonnie Foote. The veteran coach is looking for big things this season.

“So far, we’ve had a great start. Kids have come ready to play; they’re excited about playing volleyball. We’ve got good chemistry this year,” she said. “There’s no superstar right now in our program. Everyone is just out here working hard and we’re focusing on improving every single day, and from there we’ll see what happens.”

Foote leads an experienced coaching staff. Her lead assistant once again this year will be Dave Bachman. Bachman, in his second year as both Mount Si assistant coach and head junior-varsity coach, also assists Foote on the KJ Volleyball Club team she coaches. Foote’s team placed 11th at the Junior Olympic Nationals tournament in Atlanta earlier this summer. Jenny Freed and Callie Wesson round out the coaching staff this year. Freed, who will coach Mount Si’s C-team, coaches with the Northwest Juniors club, and previously played at Bellevue Community College. Wesson, who will serve as varsity assistant, played volleyball at Green River Community College.

The returning cast is led this season by senior Faith Hutcherson. Also among key returning athletes this year are juniors Alisha Larion and Danielle Rehm, and sophomore Miranda Pratt. All of these players did great things last season and will need to continue that in order for the Wildcats to be successful. Pratt is excited about what lies ahead.

“I’m excited because I think we have a really good team and we just bond really well, so I think we’re going to do good,” Pratt said.

Hutcherson is only one of three seniors this season; the others are Amy Ayers and Alison Loud. Hutcherson, who’s undecided on her college plans right now, looks to provide leadership. “Well, [I’m] trying to be an example for the young girls. I mean, we’re young, but we’re talented, and they inspire me just to try to lead them and show them the ropes of Mount Si volleyball and get them started,” Hutcherson said.

Foote does not report any new players of note at this time but as the season wears on, that could change. She will have a strong program to draw from; 45 girls turned out, of which coaches kept 35.

“I just think every year that it’s growing and people are starting to fall in love with volleyball. There’s so many opportunities for kids to play volleyball at a higher level,” Foote said.

The coach is not sure about where this team will end up, but indicates that improvement is key to the team’s success. To sustain that improvement over the course of the entire season, she establishes benchmarks.

“Well, we have set standards for our team. We have set standards individually for our players and we really believe in the philosophy that you work on the things that you want to improve on by setting standards and, like, for example, our passing. We want to be about 50 percent perfect and each kid has their own individual standards and goals that they want to be at as well, and as the individual improves, the team improves,” Foote said.

Foote also isn’t sure about how the league looks, but it’s safe to say that Issaquah, Newport and Mercer Island will challenge for that top spot.

Mount Si High School is set to host both the Kingco Conference and Kingco’s portion of the SeaKing district volleyball tournaments at the end of the season, so local volleyball fans have something to look forward to.

“Well, obviously first thing you can talk about the facility. I mean, people were kind of complaining a little bit about the drive, but you know, we have the best facility as far as having three full courts and that sort of thing,” Foote said,. “There’s never any room when you go to Liberty or Newport. You can’t jump serve and so much of people’s offense right now is their serving and the inability to jump serve really affects you when you do it all year long.”

Hutcherson’s goal this season lies far beyond Snoqualmie.

“We’re aiming for state,” she said.