Tall, talented Mustangs seek new challenge

MOUNT VERNON -- Shirley Ryan foresaw this team's destiny years in advance."You could see this coming when they were 10," said Ryan, the volleyball coach at Mount Vernon High School. "They were phenomenal when they were young kids."Then they grew, and grew, and grew."After slipping one step short in 2007 and 2008, the Mustangs reached the summit last November, breezing to the Class 2A state championship.

So what frontier remains? What's left to conquer? For starters, a legacy is dangling out there, just waiting to be secured.Mount Vernon returns four all-staters. Prepvolleyball.com lists the Mustangs 32nd nationally in its preseason rankings. That's tops in Iowa, in any class. And that's reasonable. This could be -- should be -- the premier program in the state.Three players have commited to Division-I programs -- Elite all-stater Ali Stark will go to Illinois, Amanda Platte to Drake, Courtney Kintzel to Northern Iowa.So much talent at a relatively small school."It's a setter's dream to have so many good, tall girls, hitting the ball like they do. I have a great job," said Sarah Ryan, the granddaughter of the coach and the quarterback of the team, who -- like the three D-I players -- earned all-state recognition in 2009.With talent comes expectations. The Mustangs are fine with that."We know there's a lot on our shoulders, and a lot of it comes from ourselves," Stark said. "We expect a lot from ourselves and each other. And we do want to win another state championship."

Mount Vernon returns to Class 3A this year. The Mustangs were 3A runners-up in 2007 and 2008. And as good as the Mustangs are, a 3A title is no gimme. Teams like Waverly-Shell Rock (the defending 3A champion), Dubuque Wahlert, Sioux City Heelan and West Delaware will provide far more than mild competition.

"Everybody knows that 3A is going to be a tough (class). That pushes us to get better," Platte said."Nothing will be given to us," Coach Ryan said.Eleven seniors are on the roster. Most have been together from the start."We've played together for so long," Kintzel said. "We were a fierce little fifth-grade team."There's nothing little about them now. Five of them stand 6 feet or taller.But there's more to this team than long, tall leapers. There's intelligence, on and off the court. Platte, for instance, will be an actuarial science major at Drake. That's not a major for dummies."It's such a joy, going to camps and learning drills, then bringing them back here and seeing the girls figure them out so fast," Coach Ryan said.The Mustangs open Thursday at Williamsburg. If all goes as planned, they'll close Nov. 13 at the U.S. Cellular Center.One championship is already in the bank. Now, a legacy awaits."If we put our minds to it, we can do anything," Kintzel said.