Barratt, Pups Primed Well-Traveled Veteran Makes G-Prep The Talk In Gsl Volleyball
She has traveled across the country and off the Western Hemisphere to challenge some of the world’s best volleyball players.
Why, then, is Brandy Barratt positively giddy about another Greater Spokane League volleyball season?
You can look at her peers on the Inland Empire Volleyball Club for part of the answer.
Barratt, a two-year veteran at Gonzaga Prep, has missed one big experience that her IEVC friends haven’t.
“The girls from my club team are mainly from Idaho, and have all been to (prep) state (tournaments),” Barratt said. “I’ve never been, and that’s something I’d like to do.”
Another reason is the opportunity to display her talents for family and friends.
“The GSL is fun because the people you know are there to watch you,” said the 6-foot-1 middle blocker, who played before a lot of unfamiliar faces this summer as a member of the United States Junior National team in Slovakia. “Here, there’s somebody to play for.”
SomeTHING to play for, also. If coaching veterans are correct, G-Prep is the main team to beat for the GSL title.
That’s saying a lot about Barratt’s Bullpups, who have never finished better than .500 during a league season. Last year’s 8-8 record was Prep’s high-water mark.
Yet 8-8 is an accomplishment in the GSL, which is by far the state’s best volleyball league (based on having produced seven State AAA champs the last 11 years). Prep, with college recruiting prize Barratt, a mostly intact starting lineup, and gung-ho new coach Steve Gillis, appears ready to make the school more than a football factory.
Barratt is reminded of football’s domination whenever she practices in Prep’s gymnasium. Posted on the gym walls are reminders of G-Prep pigskin accomplishments. The space for volleyball honors is nearly empty.
If Bullpups volleyball finally claims some space on the walls, as expected, Barratt will be a big reason why.
After a tryout in Denver, she was selected to the 12-member junior national team that won in Slovakia.
Colleges after her include Ohio State, Penn State and Long Beach State - all NCAA Final Four vets.
Long Beach has the lead in the Barratt sweepstakes, but she won’t decide until after campus visits.
“My club coach, Art Lambert, is really helping,” Barratt said of the decision-making process. “He coached at Stanford and Notre Dame. But he doesn’t want to tell me what place to go because he doesn’t want to make a bad choice for me.”
“I’d like to be an aid or resource,” said Gillis, who came to G-Prep from Whitworth College. “But the process is done primarily during the club season.”
Club ball, Barratt said, is a big reason she has progressed from a sophomore who was surprised to make varsity to a senior who has big-time college teams at her door.
Some GSL coaches are startled by Barratt’s emergence. She was once a gentle giant, who didn’t seem to have the determination to dominate.
No more.
“I’m really mean,” Barratt said. “I just don’t like it when people get through the block. If they kill, I like to get back and stuff it in their face.
“This all started toward the end of last season. I’m kind of a shy person; not really that aggressive.”
Barratt received her height from father Scott (6-5), who played basketball for Ferris’ first graduating class. In the same Saxons class was mother Jeneen, Brandy’s coach in grade school, who has passed along some combativeness.
“She’s aggressive because she’s been a coach,” Brandy said. “She likes to be heard.”
Height and attitude, however, aren’t the entire package.
“Not that many 6-1 girls are so agile,” Gillis said. “She hits the ball a lot higher and harder than any (GSL) girl except (North Central’s) Tamara Van Engelen.”
NC opens its GSL season Thursday at Prep. Barratt promises fireworks.
“(Tamara) and I always go at it during club season,” she said. “I always try to get her and she always tries to get me.”
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