Swapping a Volleyball for a Basketball

Ashley Huntey is not done com­pet­ing this year as she has joined the women’s bas­ket­ball team after a sea­son of FSU volleyball

Competitive Spirit: Sophomore Ashley Huntey demon­strates that her skills extend beyond her 229 kills and 365 digs attained this sea­son in vol­ley­ball and onto the bas­ket­ball court, help­ing the Bulldogs toward their 75–57 win over Ashland on Friday. Photo Courtesy of Ed Hyde, FSU Photographic Services

After help­ing the Ferris vol­ley­ball team reach the NCAA Division II tour­na­ment, Huntey has her sights on help­ing turn around the women’s bas­ket­ball team, which went 13–15 last season.

Huntey, a Stanwood native, played vol­ley­ball and bas­ket­ball all four years of high school and played soft­ball in her junior year at Morley-Stanwood High School. In vol­ley­ball, she attained all-state hon­ors all four years, was named the Big Rapids Pioneer Dream Team Player of the Year in her final two sea­sons, and helped lead her high school to its first state cham­pi­onship in 2007.

In bas­ket­ball, Huntey was named an all-area per­former from 2004–2006 and was named to the all-state team in 2006.

Since she played mul­ti­ple sports through­out high school, Huntey said it felt strange to play only vol­ley­ball in her first year at Ferris.

“I am very com­pet­i­tive, so to me, play­ing one sport was just awk­ward,” said Huntey.

During the vol­ley­ball sea­son, Huntey recorded 229 kills, which was fourth on the team and added 365 digs, which was good for sec­ond amongst her team­mates. Her con­tri­bu­tions helped the Bulldogs earn a trip to the NCAA Division II tour­na­ment, which was their first since 2006.

Unfortunately, the trip did not last long as Lewis University swept the Bulldogs in three straight sets. Huntey per­son­ally found the loss very frus­trat­ing, espe­cially since the team had such a good start to the season.

“The loss was very dis­ap­point­ing, but as soon as the sea­son ended I started play­ing bas­ket­ball, which made the loss a lit­tle eas­ier to deal with,” said Huntey.

One thing that def­i­nitely made the tran­si­tion from sport to sport eas­ier for Huntey is the sup­port that she receives from her team­mates. For every home bas­ket­ball game, her vol­ley­ball team­mates come to yell and cheer her on every time she enters the game.

“It def­i­nitely makes it eas­ier know­ing I have such great sup­port from both teams,” said Huntey.

Even though play­ing a sport in col­lege takes up a lot of a student’s time, Huntey is also an all-star in the class room. She is tak­ing classes full-time and is cur­rently wait­ing to be accepted into the nurs­ing pro­gram. Huntey is just as com­pet­i­tive sit­ting in a desk as she is on the court.

“Being as com­pet­i­tive as I am, I feel that any­thing less than an A is unac­cept­able,” said Huntey.

Huntey started play­ing sports when she was only seven years old and it looks like she will not be stop­ping any­time soon; at least not until the end of this year’s bas­ket­ball season.

Huntey laughed as she jok­ingly said, “For now I think I am just going to keep it to the two
sports.”