By Rodney Haas 

605 Sports 

PLATTE — Kori VanDerWerff and Kolbi Hoffman have been playing volleyball together since Kindergarten after both got interested in the sport from their older sisters. 

So it wasn’t a surprise earlier this year the two Platte-Geddes sophomores would also share a couple 1,000 career milestones — with VanderWerff recording her 1,000 kill while Hoffman recorded her 1,000 assist.  

“It’s really fun. It’s a big accomplishment to get it as a sophomore,” said the 6-foot-2 outside hitter VanDerWerff. “It’s a team thing too. You have to work together as a team to get all those kills and having a good setter does help.” 

VanDerWerff and Hoffman are also the leaders of a young Black Panthers team that consists of two seniors, five juniors, six sophomores and one freshman, as Platte-Geddes (10-15) sits third in the Region 2A standings behind Miller and Mobridge-Pollock.    

“It’s unfortunate that we lost today, but with a young team we have to get to committing less errors. There are some errors that we commit that are unnecessary, but that’s a part of growing up and playing a sport,” said head coach Katie Hunhoff, after Tuesday’s five set loss to Kimball/White Lake. “You want to be playing your best ball your last two weeks. It doesn't matter your record. You could make it to the SoDak 16 and go up against a No 1 or a No 2 and take them down, just like basketball. We’ve talked about that since the middle of the season. We just have to be playing our best ball, but nothing is out of touch.” 

The Black Panthers will host the SESD tournament this weekend and will close out the regular season against Winner and Ethan — giving VanDerWerff and Hoffman more opportunities to continue to add to their career numbers.  

“It was little over halfway through this year (they reached the 1,000 milestone) so you never know what they will have this year and then you look at next year, they might hit another 1,000,” Hunhoff said. “I haven’t looked into it, but I'm sure they will be at the top of the leaderboard by the time they graduate.”

In addition to volleyball, the two also play basketball in the winter and compete in track and field in the spring. They are also part of a large class of 46 sophomores at the high school that has not only helped the volleyball team, but the football which entered Thursday’s 9A playoffs with a 7-2 record led by a roster dominated by sophomores. 

“We have a pretty big class with a lot of boys and a lot of girls so it’s pretty fun to grow with them as well and do all the sports as well and continue to develop,” VanDerWerff said.  

Hoffman added the key will be, “Just trying to keep everyone out and grow the volleyball team.” 

VanDerWerff said she would like to go on to play volleyball in college and added she had a few teams look at her but nothing too big. As for Hoffman who admits she has a disadvantage compared to her taller teammate, so instead she’s taking the wait and see approach. 

“I’m pretty short, so we will see if any schools look at me if that happens so we'll see what happens,” Hoffman said. “It’s a huge accomplishment (1,000 assists) and I can’t do it without the passers and the hitters. I think just running a 5-1 (offensive scheme) last year helped. Since I ran a 5-1 last year, I wasn’t surprised at reaching it.”