Advancing to state final thrilling for Indians

By MICKEY ALVARADO

Playing in a state championship game is about as exciting as it gets for high school teams and coaches and the experience is one Tecumseh High School varsity volleyball coach Kerry Watkins will not soon forget.

Watkins has coached the Indians for the past five seasons and winning the regional title and advancing to the Class B state quarterfinals was the furthest she’d ever taken the Indians. But they weren’t done quite yet. After a win in the semifinals, she and her girls were standing on the court in Battle Creek’s Kellogg Arena playing for the Class B state title for the first time in Tecumseh’s history. The Indians advanced as far as the state semifinals back in 1989.

“It was exciting for us,” said Watkins. “I think the thing that we took from it most was just all the community and fans’ support that we got.”

Watkins said the Indians had three times the support in the semifinal and final as other teams attending and it meant so much to the team to have their backing.

Tecumseh was swept for the first time this season in the championship final, losing 25-13, 25-20, 25-19 to Fruitport, the defending state Class B champions.

“We’d been playing good volleyball, so that was nice, and it was nice to get as far as we did,” said Watkins. “The girls were disappointed with second place but when we go back and look on it it’s definitely a successful year because nobody expected it from us.”

While Tecumseh finished as the state runner-up, the Indians set a school wins record at 55-4-1 overall. Tecumseh won all seven of its tournaments this year and had senior Carly Tillotson set the state assists record in a season for the Indians with 1,582. Watkins had both Tillotson and Kelsey Berrington sign National Letter of Intents for colleges. Berrington will play for Valparaiso, a Division 1 University while Tillotson will attend Siena Heights University.

Now that she and the Indians have been in the big show they’ll be better prepared if opportunity knocks again.

“There’s a lot of protocol things,” Watkins said.

The first day the Indians used the wrong door for an entrance and the long TV timeouts threw them off a little bit between play.

“We’re usually really fast,” said Watkins. “Even if I call a timeout I never use the full minute, maybe 20 seconds of it, and then they’re back out on the court.”

They eventually figured things out but knowing protocol ahead of time allows a team to concentrate more on its upcoming match. Watkins said in the semifinals and finals, there weren’t many teams that were there for the first time and the Indians were the only team she saw whose girls were loose and dancing in the timeouts.

“Our focus level ends right there when the music starts,” said Watkins. “But again, we were really loose and I think that helped us play well. If we were thinking about the whole situation I don’t think we’d play as well.”

It may take a while for the reality of the team’s accomplishments to sink in.

“It’s kind of been a whirlwind season,” said Watkins.

Knowing what the team’s final goal is after having actually seen it should help the youth who were at the state games this season. While Watkins will be losing some talent to graduation, those returning after being to the championship finals should bring with them added confidence.

“We had the goal but didn’t really even know what it was,” said Watkins. “Now we can see that goal clearly. I’m looking forward to the future. We have some good girls coming up. I’m excited about the next few years.”