By Brian Shaw | [email protected]

Going into the 2020 season, Cottonwood High School head volleyball coach Rae Mulitalo said she didn't know what to expect from her team. 

She knew her Cottonwood Colts would be experienced—not necessarily in volleyball though. 

"A lot of my girls don’t play club volleyball, most are actually basketball players," Mulitalo said. "If I could get them to play and train volleyball in the off season, we could have a strong squad." 

Most of her players specialized in putting a round ball into a hoop and that was OK with her—in fact, she thought it was kind of awesome. But she always believed that if they started taking volleyball a bit more serious, they could be a force to be reckoned with in that too. 

The regular season kind of went like she thought it might, as the Colts (5-11) reeled off four straight losses to open this pandemic season then started finding its groove and won three of the next four. 

By the time October struck, you could not take Cottonwood for granted if you were a region foe. It was a tough out for anyone, as Hillcrest and Highland found out when they lost. 

The Colts took rival Murray to the brink in a five-set slugfest and nearly knocked off mighty East to end the month, heading into the state tournament. 

A solid region record of five wins gave Cottonwood a decent seeding and a winnable state tournament opener at 21-8 Box Elder. 

But the Colts dropped the first set 25-15 at Box Elder and proceeded to lose the next two sets 25-14 and 25-10 to wrap up a good season by all accounts. 

For Cottonwood, senior Gladyz Fakaosiula was the glue that held the team together. The team captain led the Colts in kills (73) and served up 11 aces, a team-best. 

The 5-foot-9 outside hitter also topped the team in digs with 109 and had 89 receptions. 

Junior middle blocker Shae Sorensen was the defensive stalwart for Cottonwood. Standing at 5-foot-9 as well, Sorensen was the top Colt in blocks with 35. 

The other big contributor was senior right setter Melekoloa Vaitai, who had a whopping 75 assists. 

The Colts will say goodbye to nine of its 14 varsity players, but will welcome back several who were juniors this year and bring in several other underclassmen who played significant junior varsity minutes, according to Mulitalo. 

"My sophomores and JV play really well together,” she said, “so these next few years can be very rewarding if they continue to work hard."