Meg Roussos / The BulletinBend High seniors Callie Kruska, left, and Cassidy Wheeler have helped lead the Lava Bears to two consecutive fifth-place finishes in the Class 5A state tournament. Coach Kristin Cooper thinks they can lead them even farther this season.

Kristin Cooper is well aware of the prominence of the Intermountain Conference.

In her seven years as the Bend High volleyball coach, Cooper has seen IMC members rack up 25 state playoff appearances, 18 state tournament trophies and eight state championships. The level of difficulty to simply survive the league schedule and advance to the postseason has proven to be lofty.

Yet with that quality of competition comes a spike in confidence. And over the past two years, that confidence has helped the Lava Bears nab two Class 5A fifth-place trophies — their first pieces of tourney hardware since 1995.

“We know we come from great volleyball here and that every match we go into is a great match and that it’s going to make us better,” says Cooper, now in her eighth season at Bend High. “We’ve got strong teams all around.”

“It’s good volleyball,” adds Mountain View coach Jill McKae. “I came from California, where every team you played was really strong. It’s really fun for me to be in a community that is like that.”

But while the IMC is flush with quality teams, McKae figures Bend High will be exceptionally strong, perhaps poised to win its first IMC championship since 1995. Says the Cougars coach of the rival Lava Bears: “They’re going to be the team to beat.”

“We can go all the way if we want to,” says Cooper, now in her eighth season at Bend. “The girls are going to be as good as they want to be. This well-roundedness and the depth and the hunger — we’re ready to put it all together.”

Between 1975 and 1995, Bend High trophied three times. But over the past two years, the Lava Bears have brought two fifth-place trophies back to Central Oregon.

The front end of two straight fifth-place finishes in 2012 was a long time coming, Cooper says. Finally witnessing the payoff of hard work and sacrifice was unforgettable. But now, a precedent has been set for the Lava Bears.

“Now you don’t want to be the team that doesn’t go back (to state),” Cooper says. “You’ve got a taste of it, and now you want it every time.”

Bend High is in good position to continue its upward trend, as 10 players — eight of them seniors — return to the team in 2014. That group includes all-state selections Cassidy Wheeler and Callie Kruska, who Cooper says makes up a solid core for Bend as the Bears look to make a statement each time they step on the court.

And with the two seniors having been a part of both Bend High fifth-place teams — and with the Lava Bears coming off a heartbreaking five-set defeat to Churchill of Eugene in last season’s third-place match — Cooper says her squad is “hungry” to return to the finals site.

“It fueled our fire even more so,” Wheeler says. “Getting fifth place twice in a row, it makes us this season want to go farther, to go higher, to get a better seed than we did in the previous two years. This program is finally building itself, finally becoming something, making something out of what we had.”

“It’s like we’re going to go back even more determined,” Kruska adds. “Place even higher. Do even better. Push ourselves even more the next time for those few extra points and win that game.”

That is the goal, Cooper notes. The aim is to continuously improve. But the Bend coach refuses to look too far into the future. The Lava Bears still want to nab their first IMC title in nearly 20 years. Heck, Bend still has to get through the rigors of the Intermountain Conference.

And as far as Kruska and Wheeler are aware, the IMC is the toughest league in Class 5A.

“We have such a tough conference. … We see some of the best competition 20 minutes from the high school,” Wheeler says. “Any of our competition is definitely going to help us for the postseason.”

That competition only strengthens Bend High, Kruska says, as IMC foes hone the Lava Bears for a potential third consecutive trip to the state tournament at Liberty High School in Hillsboro.

There is always room for improvement, the two senior leaders agree. But, Kruska says: “I think we’ve definitely made a statement, especially in our league, that we are up there. We’re definitely a strong team.”

In what is certainly a strong league.

—Reporter: 541-383-0307, glucas@bendbulletin.com.