Lady Raiders will be stronger, says new coach

Nathan Piturachsatit is taking over as the head coach for Lake Roosevelt volleyball with a strength and fitness emphasis which he hopes will make for a better Lady Raider team.

Coach Piturachsatit is a sixth-grade teacher at Grand Coulee Dam Middle School, where he has been the head track coach for the Pirates. His emphasis there on fitness has lead to league championships.

This is the first time Nathan Piturachsatit has coached volleyball, but his assistant, and wife Raehanne has coached volleyball before at Rogers High School in Spokane.

Piturachsatit will bring his “Piratesentics” to the Lady Raider volleyball program that has few returning starters from last fall.

That being said, Piturachsatit had 26 upperclassmen attend an interest meeting this spring. Along with six incoming freshmen, the Lady Raiders have 32 athletes turning out. That means for the first time in years Lake Roosevelt could have a C Squad for volleyball.

The Lady Raiders will be competing in the Central Washington 2B League that has only eight member schools for this classification cycle. The combo North Central League with the 1B schools that appeared to be a done deal last winter has fallen apart for unknown reasons. Now the Lady Raiders will travel not only to White Swan but to Oroville for league play.

With Riverside Christian fielding a volleyball squad, the Lady Raiders will be playing 14 league matches, leaving only two non-league matches compared to last year's six.

With the longer league play and the fact that Kittitas and Riverside Christian are returning much of their starting lineups, the Lady Raiders must start now to be in competitive shape to challenge for a state berth.

To do just that, Piturachsatit has instituted a new policy: Players must lift weights before they can use the gym during the summer. Workouts are scheduled on Monday, Wednesday, Friday in the evenings, starting from 7:30 to 9 p.m. in the Lake Roosevelt weight room.

The Lady Raiders will be traveling to Whitworth for a team camp August 14-16 before starting fall training, which starts on August 20.