After having one of their better seasons in recent history, the Charles Henderson Lady Trojan volleyball team hits the reset button with a brand-new roster under head coach Sonny Kirkpatrick.

The Trojans finished last season nine games above .500 with just 10 losses.

“We had a really good season,” Kirkpatrick said. “Out of our 10 losses I think seven of them were against ranked teams. Even a couple of those went to the elite 8. We competed at a high level against some really good teams. We have been working extremely hard to get back to the level that we were at this year.”

During his time with the Trojans, Kirkpatrick has always strived to play the best teams.

“We are never going to be satisfied with playing lesser competition. That’s not going to make us better as a program.”

Kirkpatrick would like his team to build off last season’s success, but this season, the Trojans return just two varsity players off last season roster, leaving Kirkpatrick and the Trojans to restart from the beginning.

“We basically have a brand-new team,” Kirkpatrick said. “We are very young, but at the same time, at the end of the year we will be pretty solid. It’s just right now we don’t have any experience.”

The Trojans have called up a handful of players from last year’s junior varsity program, but even with their minimal experience, Kirkpatrick is treating this season as a restart.

“We brought four or five players up from JV,” Kirkpatrick said. “While it’s a fun group to be with, we just don’t have a lot of experience. But, there are worse things than being inexperienced.”

Because of that Kirkpatrick and the Trojans have gotten back to the basics at practice up to this point. They will ultimately put that practice to the test beginning on August 27 when they travel to take on 7A Enterprise. Tentatively, Charles Henderson will play in a handful of volleyball tournaments including the Mac Attack Tournament in Montgomery on Saturday, September 7. They will participate in the Enterprise Invitational on September 14 before hosting their own tournament on September 21.