Young Ravens look for breakout season in 2007

Coming off the program’s first winning season since 2002, the Franklin Pierce volleyball team looks to continue its climb towards the top of the Northeast-10 conference in 2007. The Ravens finished 2006 with an 18-10 overall record and a conference mark of 9-5 (sixth place), and the team will look to better that mark with a squad that lost only one player to graduation.

Head coach Sharon Bonaventure enters her second season at the helm of the FPU volleyball team after taking over before the 2006 season. Despite fielding a team that had only one senior on the roster, the Ravens lost consecutive games only once all season and earned a berth in the Northeast-10 Tournament for the second consecutive season. This season, Bonaventure has a roster without a senior, and so the head coach will rely heavily on the team’s three juniors and six sophomores.

“The outlook for the year is very promising as well as exciting,” Bonaventure said. “We lost only one starter from last year's team due to graduation. I believe the combination of experience and the incoming talent of our new players is going to make for a very interesting conference season for us.”

With a year of experience, the Franklin Pierce offensive unit should only improve on last season, led by junior co-captains Karissa Hookstadt (Camarillo, Calif./Camarillo) and Nicole Buchholz (Ashburn, Va./Stone Bridge). Hookstadt returns for her second season as team captain in 2007 after finishing fifth in the NE-10 with 10.44 assists per game, and the 2006 Northeast-10 third-team selection will once again roam the middle for the Ravens. Buchholz was named to the NE-10 second team in her sophomore season, as she finished tied for second in the conference in blocks per game and second on the team with over 2.5 kills per match.

The offense will also be aided by a talented trio of sophomores. Outside hitters Caitlynn Parnell (Medina, Texas/Medina) and Katie Ristow (Miami, Fla. Miami Killian Senior HS) both played in every game last season for the Ravens, as Parnell led the squad in kills and finished second in digs, while Ristow also finished in the top three in both categories. Megan Feldmeth (South Pasadena, Calif./South Pasadena) finished second on the team in blocks as a freshman as well and will be utilized again this season.

The Ravens also will look for offensive support from junior Emily Schultz (Salem, Wis./Westosha Central), sophomore Kelly Mahoney (Wakefield, R.I./South Kingstown) and freshmen Michelle Koike (San Francisco, Calif./Sacred Heart Cathedral) and Diana Rutt (Dayton, Nev./Dayton). Koike comes to FPU from Gonzaga University, where she redshirted the 2006 season.

The team’s defense will have to replace libero Michelle McConnell, last season’s sole senior. The responsibility for bolstering the defense will fall to sophomores Lindsay Burrill (Salem, N.H./Salem) and Brigit Feeney (Voorhees, N.Y./Voorhees) and freshmen Chelsie Kohout (Harrison Township, Mich./L’Anse Creuse) and Erika Takegawa (Fukuoka, Japan). Kohout and Takegawa will likely share the libero and defensive specialist duties this season.

The Ravens will once again face a challenging schedule, as the team will play 33 games and 14 conference matches. The team begins the 2007 campaign at the Nova Southeastern Shark Classic in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., on Aug. 24-25, and the Ravens will then return home for the 2007 home-opener against C.W. Post on Aug. 30 at 1 p.m. Despite the tough schedule, Bonaventure is confident that the Ravens will put together another successful season, with the prospect of a berth in the NCAA Regionals at season’s end.

“We intentionally scheduled this year against teams that will consistently test us throughout the season,” Bonaventure said. “It is a nice mix of conference matches, which are always competitive, and regional competition with the likes of Dowling and New Haven. After opening at the Nova Southeastern Tournament at the end of August, it will be a wild ride until [the NCAA] Regionals in mid-November.”

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