WATERTOWN, S.D. — Long before taking the court on the Watertown sideline, Havyn Heinz was a standout athlete just down the road, starring for the Huron Tigers.
Heinz was a five year starter for the Tigers, capping off her high school career placing third at the 2019 Class AA state tournament and being selected as South Dakota Miss Volleyball.
“I got to compete my whole time at Huron,” Heinz recalled. “I was very lucky and grateful that I got to play varsity since I was an eighth grader, so I got to experience a lot of different things.”
During her time with the Tigers, Heinz played under legendary Huron coach Shelley Buddenhagen.
“She’s a legend,” Heinz said. “She’s very competitive, and I learned a lot from her as both a player and as a coach. She definitely made me a better competitor throughout my years there.”
Following high school, Heinz took her talents to the collegiate level, spending her first two seasons at Northern State University before transferring to Wayne State College. At Wayne State, Heinz helped lead her team to back-to-back conference titles, a regional hosting bid, and an Elite Eight appearance.
“At Wayne, we were part of a very successful team, which was really fun,” Heinz said. “I got to learn both as a player and now as a coach of why those teams were successful.”
It wasn’t long before the coaching bug bit Heinz, a transition that felt natural after years of high-level competition.
“Honestly, it was kind of all throughout high school and college,” she said. “I kind of just had the love for the sport and I wanted to give back to something that gave me so much.”
That passion brought Heinz to Watertown for her first year as a head coach, taking over a storied Arrows program following the resignation of long-time head coach Rosemary Bellum in 2025. Bellum spent 28 years with the Watertown program, including her final nine at the helm.
Heinz inherits a program accustomed to postseason success: Watertown finished fifth at the Class AA state tournament in 2023 with a 27-7 record, sixth in 2024 at 26-8, and fourth in 2025 with a 22-11 mark.
Taking over a winning program presented both an opportunity and a unique learning curve.
“The assistant coaches were very helpful, and it made the transition really smooth for me to come here to Watertown,” Heinz said. “Just learning how they did things… my assistants have been very helpful and supportive through that whole transition.”
When asked what she has learned most in her inaugural season, Heinz emphasized staying true to herself.
“Just to continue to be me, to be myself,” she said. “Because I’ve experienced a lot of different things both as a player and on the coaching side.”
The 2026 Arrows squad has continued its history of success led by a group of six seniors, holding an 18-9 record this season.
“I have a really good group of seniors — senior leadership,” Heinz said. “They’ve been really great, and they’re a really competitive group, so I think they have really helped this team continue in the right direction.”
Though Watertown faced tough battles against top-ranked competition this season, Heinz sees plenty of promise as the postseason begins.
“They’re competing,” Heinz said of her squad. “The games that we lost, they’re right there. We’re competing with really good teams right now, and we’re just like one to two points away from changing the outcome of some of those really close games. I don’t think that we’ve reached our full potential yet, which is really exciting going into the postseason now.”
Navigating her first year also meant facing her alma mater twice — once at Watertown Civic Arena on September 22 and again at her old home, Huron Arena, on October 15. Watertown won both meetings, though the matchups brought a strange mix of emotions for the first-year coach.
“The first time was really weird,” Heinz said. “It was more weird going the second time because I actually got to go to Huron… It was funny because after the game I was talking to some people and I was like, ‘Yeah, every time they said like point Tigers, I would be like, what, this feels weird,’ because I’m going against them. I think it’s going to take a while to get used to, but it was definitely a really weird feeling.”
That postseason journey now faces its first key hurdle Thursday night when Watertown hosts Brookings in the SoDak 16. The Arrows defeated Brookings 3-0 in both regular-season matchups this year, but the stakes are clear: the winner punches their ticket to the Class AA State Tournament.
“We just have to go out and compete and play Watertown volleyball, which is being disciplined, scrappy, and just having a lot of fun,” Heinz said. “When we focus on ourselves and we just go out and compete and enjoy what we’re doing, we’ll be just fine.”
