Volleyball Set for Home Opener
By Jeremy Jacob, Harbinger
Monday, Sept. 7, 2015
This Illinois Central College Volleyball team may be young, but they’re also mighty. After finishing seventh at the NJCAA national tournament last year, the Cougars are looking to improve even more despite a younger roster.
Graduating eight sophomores including All-Americans Kattie Lee and Jacqueline Twing may lead one to overlook the good attributes of this years team. “There will never be another Kattie Lee, but we do a have a Brooke Jacobs,” said Lindsay Herman, assistant coach and former NJCAA All-American.
Preseason rankings are another thing that looks mostly at what a team loses from the previous year. “Rankings are just numbers,” Herman said.
Disregarding all the players lost to graduation and the preseason rankings, you have a team full of size and athleticism according to head coach Sue Sinclair. This size and athleticism creates a well-balanced team which is why you can’t pick out one star player.
“We don’t rely on one player taking the swings,” Sinclair said. “I look at the stat sheet and our players have about the same number of kills.”
Versatility is another valuable quality of this team, which means multiple players can adapt to multiple positions. It’s difficult for a team to be able to do this, according to Sinclair, since the angles are different while a play unfolds.
Sinclair explained that its similar to learning a different position in any other sport like in baseball when a first baseman transitions to shortstop. The shortstop position requires covering a lot of ground unlike the first base position which creates quite a learning curve, similar to how it is on the volleyball court.
An aspect that can’t be overlooked on a team hungry for success is great team chemistry. “Team chemistry will take us far,” said sophomore Megan Beutke.
Photograph: Mark Nycz
This team not only says they have it, they also show they have it. One instance where they did is when they took on the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge.
If you follow the team on social media, there’s a good chance you’ve already seen it and know that they kept to protocol by challenging all other ICC Athletic teams and Region 24 volleyball teams. What you might not know is their motivation in doing it.
The idea came from an assistant coach that saw people dumping ice cold water over their heads for a good cause on 60 minutes. She saw it was a cause that was creating a lot of awareness of the disease and realized that friends of the team had been affected by it.
After a long session of practice, the players and coaches tested their trust for each other and their camaraderie by dumping ice water over their heads together. Their trust and camaraderie is tested when they’re together on the court as well and they usually pass that test.
There is something that this coaching staff will admit about this young roster and that’s that they have to be patient with this team’s mistakes early in the season. “It’s a process and we’ll have to continue looking toward the end goal,” Sinclair said.
They’ll have plenty of time over a long season to improve and look toward to that end goal of going further than they did last year.
The roster includes sophomores Megan Beutke (Long Point, IL), Anna Crank (Washburn), Savannah Fillion (Ballwin, Missouri), Michelle Kelly (Princeton) and Katie Kupferschmid (Prairie Central).
Freshmen include Grace Aeschleman (Roanoke-Benson), Darian Baldwin (Lewistown), Brooke Jacobs (East Peoria), Shannon Kempf (Metamora), Whitney Nichols (Elkhart, Illinois), Paige Pasley (Farmington), Morgan Twing (Rock Island) and Emily Zelhart (Farmer City, Illinois).
The Cougars began their season on the road going 3-3 and will have their home opener at 7p.m. Tuesday, Sept. 8 against Frontier Community College at the CougarPlex.