Holmes returns to the court with the Lady Blackhawks

SEELEY LAKE – Raised in Seeley Lake, Seeley-Swan High School's new head volleyball coach Shelby Holmes is excited to share her positivity and lessons learned with this year's Lady Blackhawks. While the team's ultimate goal is to make it to the state tournament, Holmes said everything is day-by-day and the team is just excited to have the opportunity to play.

Holmes started playing basketball and volleyball at Seeley Lake Elementary. She played both sports through high school graduating from SSHS in 2014 and playing for past head coach Tammy Lewis for two years.

Miles Community College recruited Holmes to play basketball. She was a walk-on during the summer of 2014, however, she was offered a scholarship because of her hard work and initiative.

After getting her associates degree, Holmes continued to play basketball when she transferred to Eastern Nazarene College. While working on her master's in education, Holmes was an assistant basketball coach.

"You dive right into everything. You are recruiting for the next year, you are scouting teams you are playing, you are doing individual workouts with the girls, you are at practice doing things, games doing different stats and different things like that on the bench," said Holmes. "I've got a little bit of coaching experience, a little bit of playing experience."

When Holmes moved back to Seeley Lake this past spring, she wasn't ready to get out of coaching. When the head volleyball coach position opened, she applied. She has spent the summer developing herself as a volleyball coach.

She appreciates all the female coaches who have impacted her athletic career and she has been fine-tuning her skills on the court. She added past head volleyball coach at Bigfork Schuyler Tudor has been giving her resources. But she also looks at it more broadly.

"I learned so much from sports. It taught me so much about life," said Holmes. "That is what I'm hoping to bring to the court is just teaching life skills and helping these girls get ready for the next step, whatever that is, and helping them grow as athletes and people as much as possible."

Holmes said Lewis laid a great foundation of skills for the players.

"They had tools in place to be successful," said Holmes. "Now I just get to help captain the ship."

While Holmes acknowledges that coaching basketball and volleyball are very different on the court, there are a lot of similarities with coaching. She is a positive person, she encourages others and looks forward to playing up the strengths of the team. She appreciates the perspective the new assistant coach Alyssa Harris brings. Harris played volleyball in high school and has been very supportive of everything.

"We are looking to win games and hopefully that is what you will see on the court," said Holmes. "We will play to [the players'] strengths and get them to be in a position to where they will be most successful."