Barratt Bangs Away G-Prep Grad Changes Positions, Hits It Off Big With Ncaa Champions

Brandy Barratt’s voice sounds sick, crackling and scratching like a worn 45. She thinks she might be permanently hoarse. At least until the Long Beach State volleyball season ends.

“Too much yelling,” said Barratt. “We have a lot of miscommunication plays and that’s the big dilemma that we’re trying to get past.”

Barratt’s body is banged up. She said her left ankle has bothered her since May when she began training with the World University Games team on a cement floor in Lake Placid, N.Y.

“It’s constant pain. I feel it when I’m just walking around,” said the 1995 Gonzaga Prep graduate.

Barratt’s right kneecap isn’t 100 percent, either.

“It got off track sometime last week. It’s probably tendonitis,” Barratt said in her loudest whisper.

But Barratt knows there’ll be time for her larynx and legs to heal. For now, it’s business as usual for the defending NCAA Division I volleyball champions. The 49ers next stop is at Idaho on Thursday at 7 p.m.

Long Beach, ranked fifth in the USA Today/AVCA poll, brings a 13-2 record into Moscow. It has ripped past its last six Big West Conference opponents - dropping just two games - and has only lost to Top 5 teams Hawaii and Pacific. Pacific, meanwhile, lost to No. 7 Santa Barbara. The Gauchos followed with a loss at Cal Poly. Idaho, which hasn’t beaten Long Beach in four tries, is hoping to get in on the conference’s topsy-turvy action.

“No one should be taken lightly this year with all the things that are going on in the Big West and across the nation,” Barratt said.

Barratt hasn’t played in Moscow since her freshman year, if getting in one rotation counts as playing.

“When the subs ran out, that’s when I came in,” she recalled.

One year later at the NCAA national championships at the Spokane Arena, the hometown kid was put into one rotation in every game. Now a senior, Barratt has become a big part of what makes the 49ers remain on top.

Setter Misty May, 1998 AVCA player of the year, graduated and is off playing beach volleyball. Two-time All-American middle blocker Benishe Dillard and four-time conference selection Jessica Alvarado also graduated.

But something happened since the 49ers beat Penn State for the national championship. The 6-foot-2 Barratt was switched from middle blocker to leftside hitter.

She’d been a middle since high school, where she was named 1995 Greater Spokane League most valuable player, a Volleyball Monthly Fab-50 and Gatorade State Player of the Year. Barratt said she found out about Long Beach coach Brian Gimmillaro’s plan after last season. During the summer, Barratt also played on the outside while training with the World University Games team. She was one of the last players to be released.

“I made a bunch of mental mistakes. I really wanted to play middle and I couldn’t get that out of my head,” she said.

Barratt has made great strides since then. She’s averaging 3.38 kills per game, second behind sophomore middle blocker Cheryl Weaver. She leads the team in digs with 149 (2.81 per game). Sophomore Tayyiba Haneef, the other starting middle blocker, is averaging 3.28 kills per game.

Although the move has served Gimmillaro well, the 1998 AVCA coach of the year understood Barratt’s initial reservations.

“It’s so difficult in your final year of college to completely switch positions,” he said. “The responsibilities are different. The angles of the ball come differently and the tempo is different.”

Barratt, a finance major, plans to graduate in December 2000. She said she isn’t sure what’s next. Perhaps another shot on the national level. She said she received a call from an agent during the summer, but first wants to get through the college season.

“As of right now, I’m going to take a month off and be a normal person,” she said. “I’ll have to do something with volleyball because I’ll probably go stir crazy.”

Brandy Barratt * 6-2 senior Long Beach St. outside hitter * 1998: 1st team All-Big West * 1997: Big West All-Academic team * 1995: Gatorade State Player of the Year as Gonzaga Prep senior