SENIOR SPOTLIGHT: Sheriden Stangohr

Just keep swinging

Sheriden Stangohr is one of the most undersized and underestimated middle blockers in the Southern Conference. Checking in at 5-feet 10 inches, Stangohr ranks in the top ten of half of the statistical categories in the league and even ranks in the top 40 nationally in one of those categories.

She comes in at sixth in hitting percentage, fourth in kills and second in blocks in the league statistical rankings and has been ranked No. 31 in the nation in aces per set for the past month. Last season, she was ranked 15th in the nation in blocks in September and finished her junior season ranked among the nation's 50 best blockers.

She ranks as the all-time four-year career hitter in Samford history with a career average of .300. She became the all-time leader in block assists on Sept. 18 versus Memphis in the Memphis Invitational and most recently, she notched 1,000 kills in her career at Chattanooga on Oct. 21. She is the second Bulldog in two years to accomplish this feat. She also ranks ninth on the career block solos list with 59.

Like her fellow classmates, Stangohr is a product of having a full sports resume as a child. Although her parents never played athletics, she was involved in every sport imaginable - soccer, softball, volleyball, basketball, track and even karate. Although, she claims her karate days were short-lived because, "Who wants to go in on Saturday?"

She narrowed the field down to three in high school - volleyball, basketball and softball - but after figuring out that basketball just wasn't her sport, she traded that in for club volleyball. She played softball until she was a sophomore in high school and soon began running track.

The variety of sports played by Stangohr is telling of why she is so good at what she does on the court. She is faster, jumps higher and sees plays better than most middle blockers she faces on a weekly basis.

While most people were signing letters of intent their junior year of high school, Stangohr said she really had not had too many offers. The one that sticks out in her mind was Washburn, a liberal arts college in Topeka, Kan. However, Stangohr was not sold. For starters, it was in Kansas.

"It's cold there," said the Shawnee, Kan., native. "And it's Kansas!"

After living there all of her life, Stangohr was ready to see another part of the world - preferably a warmer part of the world.

Soon Stangohr was contacted by Michelle Durban, Samford's head coach at the time. She took a visit, really liked what she saw in Birmingham and realized that Samford was the only school that she really wanted to go to.

"The campus was pretty, it was far away and it was warm here," Stangohr said, checking off her must-have list. "The team was also really nice and welcoming." Check.

Stangohr came to Samford with the hope to really make a difference and turn the Bulldog program around. What she didn't know was that she would be part of a class that laid the foundation for a successful future for Samford volleyball.

In her freshman season, the Bulldogs only won six matches. However, as a sophomore, she helped lead her team to the first winning season in program history. As a junior, she played a part in capturing Samford volleyball's first-ever league division title and led the Bulldogs to post-season play for the first time since 2001.

There is an attitude that Stangohr acquired as a Bulldog that helped her be a part of Samford's success.

"Just keep swinging," Stangohr said. "Just keep going. Even when you are messing up, you are bound to hit one in bounds. You just have to think of it that way. And if you don't think of it that way, and you keep thinking about the error you just made, it's just going to make it so much worse. And it's really hard to get out of that."

She also said that she used to get scared and nervous before matches. Now she just remembers that she has a whole team backing her up.

Stangohr said that the thing she loves and will miss most about Samford is the built-in friendships that come with being on a team.

"Since I've been here, my best friends have come from the team," Stangohr said. "And I see them everywhere. And I don't get sick of them. I could see them 20 times a day and I wouldn't get sick of them. It's nice when you have seven new freshmen come in because, there you go, you have seven new best friends. So, you're guaranteed 14 best friends forever and you get more every year. I think that's really cool."

She will graduate in May with a bachelor's degree in marine science. In five years, Stangohr said she hopes to be living somewhere warm, working at an aquarium.

"I'd just be happy if I really just worked in an aquarium for my entire life," Stangohr said. "I feel like I go to places like that and I just know that that's what I'm supposed to be doing."

For now, Stangohr will savor the moments and continue to work hard. She'll be grateful for the wins and appreciate the lessons that come from losses, but the work is not over until that trophy is given away. And Stangohr and the rest of the Bulldog squad want to be holding that trophy when all is said and done.

SENIOR SPOTLIGHT: Katie Luckman

"Everyone has a role, whether it is on the court or off."

No one approaches the game of volleyball with a team-first mentality more than senior outside hitter Katie Luckman.

"Sometimes a right side, sometimes a left, and sometimes a defensive specialist, Katie always puts 100 percent of herself into whatever could help the team," Samford head coach Derek Schroeder said.

Although her time on the court has tapered off a bit in the last couple of years, Luckman still remains one of the most intense and vocal leaders on the team.

"I'm pretty vocal," said the Villa Hills, Ky., native. "I see the game pretty well and I understand what's going on. I want everyone else to feel the way I feel about it. Feel that passion and adrenaline that I do. Everyone has a role, whether it is on or off the court."

Luckman, much like fellow senior Sarah Gardner, had a family connection to former Samford head volleyball coach Michelle Durban. Luckman' sister played high school volleyball with Durban. A chance reunion at a tournament in Orlando gave Durban her first look at Luckman. The Samford coach was impressed and began the recruiting process. Eventually, Luckman visited Samford and was immediately offered a spot on the team.

"We took some time to think about it, but if just felt too right to say no," Luckman said. "They had everything I wanted."

Luckman was an immediate contributor to the Bulldog dynamic as a freshman. She saw action in 29 out of 30 matches that year and recorded her first double-double in Samford's first home match of the season against now conference rival Chattanooga. She even stepped in as setter for one set against Kennesaw State when Jackie Jaszcz was sidelined by a knee injury.

However, probably her most defining moment came in the last set of the last match of her sophomore season. It also stands out as her most memorable moment here at Samford.

It was Samford's final season in the Ohio Valley Conference and the Bulldogs were closing out play at home on opening weekend of the Pete Hanna Center. It had been Samford's best season yet; the first winning season in the history of the program. The Bulldogs had just beaten Eastern Kentucky for the first time ever the night before and now stood one point away from sweeping Morehead State, who was ranked second in the conference.

In a match that saw the Bulldogs win the first set, 30-25, and then the second set by a score of 37-35, Samford had trailed the Eagles the whole third set. When the Bulldogs tied the score at 30 on a kill by Sheriden Stangohr, the excitement of the crowd increased immensely. Samford took its first lead of the set on another kill by Stangohr before Luckman stepped behind the line to serve for match point.

"I remember serving the last ball into the sunbeam shining down from the windows in the fitness room of Pete Hanna," Luckman said. "I served it right in the middle of the court because the sun was right there and was like, `She's not going to be able to pass this.' And she missed it! I remember being like, `We just won!'"

Since then, shades have been installed in the windows of the fitness center.

Luckman will graduate in 2012 with a doctor of pharmacy degree. She had been told all her life that she could not let her mind be wasted because she was so good at sciences. Her mother wanted her to be a doctor, but there was just one problem.

"Well, I don't get along really well with blood," Luckman said. "I hate it. It makes me pretty squeamish."

Still, science has always come pretty easily to Luckman, especially chemistry. But her favorite part of pharmacy isn't the science. It is the connections that she is able to make with patients.
"I just really like shooting the breeze with people," Luckman said.

Luckman is a people person. Her bright personality is just one thing that makes her uniquely Katie Luckman. She is also very focused and intense.

"Whatever I do, I want to do right," Luckman said. "I would hope that people would see that as something that is uniquely me."

That approach is a solid step in the right direction on the road to a successful life.

SENIOR SPOTLIGHT: Sarah Gardner

Her path to Samford wasn't a straight one

Senior volleyball player Sarah Gardner has played sports all of her life. From fourth grade on, the Indianapolis, Indiana native played just about every sport a kid could play.

"I played soccer, softball, basketball, volleyball, kickball," Gardner said. "I played everything."

She finally narrowed it down to soccer and volleyball before choosing the latter over the former in high school since the two sports share the same season in Indiana. She continued playing club volleyball for Circle City as she had been since age 12 while also playing on her high school varsity team all four years of her high school career.

However, playing college volleyball almost didn't become a reality for Gardner. She committed to Butler University early on in her senior year of high school.

"I kind of just got sick of the recruiting process and decided to just stay close to home," Gardner said. "My dad works at Butler, we live two blocks away and it was the comfortable decision to make at the time."

Soon after, the 5-foot-8-inch defensive specialist found out that she had a fracture in her foot. She made the decision to continue playing on it, helping Bishop Chatard High School to its first-ever Indiana State Championship. She played in the Indiana All-Star match and landed a spot on her choice club team, but soon was put in a boot per doctor's orders. She made the hard decision to quit her club team as sitting out with a broken foot would have just been money wasted.

"I started to kind of experience stuff outside of volleyball," Gardner said. "It was the first time that I hadn't been playing since I was 12 years old. I was having so much fun and I was like, `You know, maybe there is more to life than just volleyball.'"

She went to her coaches at Butler and told them that she had decided that she wasn't going to play in college after all. But after just one semester at Butler, Gardner started to miss volleyball. When she would attend her brother's and sisters' athletic events, she wouldn't feel like part of the family anymore - separated athletically.

She had a connection to Samford's head volleyball coach at the time, Michelle Durban. Durban had been an assistant at Butler in recent years and had a great relationship with the Gardner family. Because Gardner had been recruited a year earlier by Durban, she gave Samford a second look and called to ask the Samford coach if she still had room on her team.

"I called her and told her that I really missed volleyball and wanted to start playing again and asked if she thought she had a spot for me on the team," Gardner said. "She told me she did. So within two weeks, I had filed all the paperwork for Butler that I was withdrawing and filled out all of the paperwork for Samford and written all of my essays and it was just like that - I'm going to Samford."

Gardner enrolled in Samford's 2006 Jan Term, practiced with the team in the spring and jumped feet first into Samford's 2006 fall season. She played in all 30 matches for the Bulldogs, even stepping in as libero midseason. She proved herself as one of Samford's power servers and led her team in aces (55) and digs (412) as a red-shirt freshman.

That year, she recorded the school's second highest single-season digs total (412), just missing the all-time record by four digs. Her most outstanding match came in her freshman season as well, as she recorded a career-high 29 digs against South Alabama in its own Jaguar Classic, just missing another school record by nine digs.

She continued to excel in the next years to come, helping the Bulldogs to their first-ever winning season as a sophomore and their first-ever conference division title as a junior. She led her team in aces again in her sophomore year with 45 while finishing her junior season ranked eighth in the nation in aces per set. She landed herself sixth on the single-season digs leader board with a total of 65 in 2008, which put her second in the conference, and currently ranks sixth on the all-time aces list with 162 in her career.

There is no doubt that Gardner's competitiveness helped her achieve such success here at Samford. Competitiveness is in Gardner's blood line.

Her dad played basketball and golf at the University of Wisconsin-Platteville. Her mom was a cheerleader and played softball at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse. Every single one of her siblings plays a sport - both younger sisters play college basketball, one at Davidson College and the other at the University of Indianapolis. From board games - their favorite is Scattergories - to basketball, it's all a competition for the Gardners. They even hold true to a holiday tradition.

"We are the most competitive family you will ever meet in your life," Gardner said, the oldest of five children. "On Christmas morning, we wake up, we open our presents, we eat and then - because my mom was a gym teacher and was the athletic director for our grade school (St. Thomas Aquinas), she has the keys to the gym and then my dad, because of his position at Butler, he has the keys to that gym - we go to St. Thomas and play dodge ball for like two hours and then we go to Butler and play basketball."

Gardner says her dad always wins but she's glad that her parents brought her up in such a competitive household.

"Some people have tried to knock my parents and said that they brought us up wrong, having us focus on sports so much," Gardner said. "But...sports teach you so much. I know how to be a team player. I had to learn how to balance work and volleyball and school my whole life. I feel like I've learned so much from sports and I attribute that 100 percent to my parents."

Gardner says that she is going to miss her team the most when her time at Samford has come to an end. From making lifelong friends to winning championships, she has gained a lot in her four years here. She has learned to appreciate the wins of the last three years after enduring a hard season of only six wins her freshman season. From watching her sister endure four ACL surgeries to watching teammates battle injuries, season in and season out, she has also learned to appreciate her health and the ability to play virtually injury-free over the last four years.

Gardner is not exactly sure what she wants to be doing once she graduates. She has aspirations of doing a lot of things from being a CEO to the next Erin Andrews of ESPN. But there is one thing that she is sure of:

"I want to find a job that I really enjoy and that I'm good at," Gardner says, "and I want to throw my whole life into it. I really want to prove to my family and prove to everyone that I can be on my own and really succeed."

Student-Athlete Feature Of The Month:Casey Garvey and Alexis Bauer

Rivals Turned Teammates

Freshman volleyball players Casey Garvey and Alexis Bauer have played together for most of their lives. They've just been on opposite sides of the net.

Before Bauer landed the job of Samford's starting libero, she was an All-American setter out of Louisville, Ky. While playing with the Kentucky Indiana Volleyball Academy (KIVA), she helped her team to three gold medals and three silver medals at the AAU Nationals and two gold medals and one silver medal at the Junior Olympics. As a senior at Sacred Heart High School, she helped her team earn a No. 16 national ranking.

Back-up setter Garvey played for the MidAmerica Volleyball Association (MAVA) for six years, her teams never finishing lower than third at AAU Nationals and fifth at the Junior Olympics. She also was an AAU All-American for three consecutive years.

A commonality that ties the two together, besides being All-American setters, is that they both were coached by members of the Garvey family.

Garvey's brother Todd coached her high school team at Mercy Academy while her other brother Eric coached Bauer's high school team at Sacred Heart. The Garvey brothers, along with their father Ken, are well-known in Louisville for their success in coaching youth volleyball.

Mercy and Sacred Heart just happened to be rivals as did Garvey's and Bauer's club teams.

"We go back from like 12s," Bauer said. "We've always been across the net from each other since I can remember. Every single one of our huge tournaments always ended up with two Louisville teams in the finals - and it was always her and me."

Although on the court it may have looked like a setter's dual was shaping up, the duo said they never saw each other as enemies off the court. They barely even knew each other personally.

"We've been rivals since we were 11," Garvey said. "We knew who each other were but we never hung out or anything.

"I was more vocal than she was so I was more of the bully at the net," Garvey said. "She's just really quiet and internally aggressive, whereas I've always been more vocal. But we've always had a good rivalry."

When they found out that they would be coming to the same college, playing on the same team, both were a little anxious to see how their puzzle pieces would fit together in the grand scheme of Samford volleyball.

It worked out that Samford would be looking for a new starter at the libero position. Bauer went up against two upperclassmen and won the role leading the Bulldogs' back row defense. Garvey would help starting setter Hillary Fountain run the offense.

The two freshmen turned out to be just half of the production that came out of the 2009 class of newcomers. Four of the team's seven freshmen saw significant playing time, earning starting positions for the majority of the season.

Bauer led the Bulldogs in digs in her freshman year, notching 403 (3.50 digs per set). She finished just nine shy of tying Sarah Gardner (2006) for fourth place on the single-season digs list and 13 away from tying Courtney Gay (2008) and Brook Skinner (1994) for second place.
Garvey racked up 270 assists on the year (2.35 per set) while also grabbing 181 digs (1.57 per set). She also led in service aces with 37 on the year, ranking her eighth in the Southern Conference in that category.

Most freshmen usually come in not expecting so see a lot of playing time. That was not the case with the 2009 class.

"A lot of people come in as freshmen and they plan to see the bench," Bauer said, "especially in a bigger program or in a year when you are not rebuilding. But that didn't really happen here. I would hate that. I love contributing."

The duo came in and helped their team to its second most successful year in the history of Samford volleyball. With the help of fellow classmates and upperclassmen and guided by second year head coach Derek Schroeder, the Bulldogs posted a string of 22 consecutive wins in the Pete Hanna Center since it opened in 2007. They also earned their second consecutive North Division title in their second year in the Southern Conference and made it to their second year of post-season play since 2001.

Samford reached the four-team Southern Conference Tournament last weekend as the No. 1 seed in the North for the second year in a row. The Bulldogs ended their season after a tough loss to College of Charleston in the semifinal round.

SENIOR SPOTLIGHT: Ashley Adams

"We've had a great season, and we are actually still having fun!"

Senior outside hitter Ashley Adams has only been a Bulldog for a year but has made an immediate impact and has been an integral part of Samford’s success in 2008. After finishing her undergraduate degree in three years, she transferred to Samford to continue her education at the Cumberland School of Law, and somehow found herself playing volleyball for the Bulldogs.

Adams came to Samford from Middle Tennessee State where she enjoyed a very successful career. As a junior, she helped lead the Blue Raiders to a Sweet 16 appearance in the 2007 NCAA Volleyball Tournament.

As a freshman, she was the first player in school history and just the second from the Sun Belt to be named AVCA Player of the Week. She received similar honors as a sophomore, including two Sun Belt Offensive Player of the Week honors and All-South Region. She also set the record for best hitting percentage in a single match at Western Kentucky.

In 2007, she was named to the Pre-season All-Sun Belt team, Most Valuable Player at every preseason tournament, named Sun Belt Offensive Player of the Week twice again and Sun Belt Offensive Player of the Year. She was voted onto the 2007 All-Sun Belt first team, named the Sun Belt Tournament MVP, and named AVCA Honorable Mention All-American for the second year in a row.

However much success she had with the Blue Raiders, volleyball became more of a chore for her than an exciting privilege.

“I’d done the whole being on a really good team thing,” Adams said. “We had gone to the Sweet 16. It was fun to win but it wasn’t fun to play volleyball. I hated volleyball. I was like, ‘I’m done.’ And when I came here, I really wasn’t going to play.”

After arriving on campus, Adams decided to research the volleyball team on the website and soon was encouraged by her former club volleyball coach to play her final year of eligibility with the Bulldogs. Adams approached Samford head coach Derek Schroeder about joining the team and he and the squad welcomed Adams with open arms.

“When I decided to play, I really wasn’t sure what was going to happen,” Adams said. “I knew that it would definitely not be as stressful as Middle Tennessee. I wasn’t really expecting much because of the previous record and I was very pleasantly surprised. We’ve had a great season, and we are actually still having fun.”

Adams has been able to enjoy the Bulldogs’ success so far, the best record in school history (22-3), the most wins in a season (22), the longest home win streak (10) and earlier this season, the longest win streak in school history (12). She has also led the team in kills (331) and attempts (736) and ranks second on the single-season list for hitting percentage with .342 so far this season. She earned a spot in the AVCA 30-Kills Club earlier this season when she notched a career-high 31 kills in Samford’s five-set match against Murray State at the Crimson Tide Invitational.

Also this season, Adams became the first Bulldog to be named Southern Conference Player of the Week twice. She has also ranked among the nation’s best in kills per set and hitting percentage and has led the conference in kills throughout the season.

With all the success, Adams has juggled a load of first year law school classes. And she says she has enjoyed every minute of it. Her teammates have been a large part of her success, enjoyment and appreciation for the year.

“Not only do I enjoy playing volleyball here, I enjoy playing with these girls,” Adams said. “The team is really important. I want to play well because I love these girls and I love this team and I’m playing for these girls. It’s not like I play well because I want my stats to go up or anything. I feel like I don’t want to let my teammates down. If I trust a teammate enough that I know that she’s going to go for a ball, I need to do the same for her. We just have that trust like we don’t want to let each other down, and that’s why we play so hard for each other.”

Adams is not a stranger to being the new kid in town. When she was growing up, she moved around a lot. She was born in Valencia, Calif., and lived there for 10 years. When she was ten, Adams’ family moved to Columbus, Ohio and lived there for six years. When she was in high school, she moved to St. Louis and finished her final two years of high school there before moving to Murfreesboro, Tenn., to attend Middle Tennessee State. While she was in college, her parents moved to Arizona and just this past year, they moved back to Columbus and live right down the street from where they lived several years ago.

Adams started playing volleyball in a recreational league when she was in fourth grade. She played basketball and softball as well, but soon gave up both after realizing she had a natural volleyball talent. When she reached high school, she gave up basketball and softball to concentrate on volleyball, playing varsity at school and club on the side.

She attributes all of her success to her parents. They were the ones that woke up in the wee hours of the morning to drive her to club tournaments and spent the money to let her play.

“They drove me to every single practice and every club tournament,” Adams said. “My mom always said, ‘I’m not going to come drag you out of bed. If you want to play, I’ll drive you wherever you need to go and we’ll pay for whatever needs to happen, but I’m not going to force to play’.”

Her parents never missed a match of her in high school and continued to follow every match of her college career either through live stats or video streaming.

One of Adams’ quirks is that she is very superstitious, but only when it comes to volleyball.

“I have to put on everything in the same order,” Adams says. “I have to start with my right leg. I do socks, socks, knee pad, knee pad, ankle brace, ankle brace. Then I have to do, tie it, tie it. I go from left to right the whole time. I have to do that. I always wear two hair bands in my hair, but I only put on in. And I will not fix my hair during warm-ups. I always leave my other hair band on my wrist and we are not supposed to. So, I always wait until the ref comes over to me before the game and tells me to take it off. Then during the National Anthem, I have to say a prayer. I have to start when the National Anthem starts and I have to be done before it ends.”

The future lawyer says she is now thinking about concentrating on sports law.

“I’m kind of leaning towards sports law and working with the NCAA in compliance and those kinds of things. I don’t think I’m ever going to be able to get away from sports. You can’t just play sports your whole life and then just stop. I think I will be involved with sports and athletes forever.”

SENIOR SPOTLIGHT: Courtney Gay

Big Things Really Do Come In Small Packages

Big things come in small packages with senior libero Courtney Gay. She is usually the smallest player on the court, yet the loudest one at the same time. And she is one of the most successful Bulldogs on the 2008 roster.

Let’s list a few of Gay’s accomplishments: Broke the school record for digs in a match twice in 2007 and continues to hold that record at 46; owns the school record for digs in a season with 574 in 2007; is Samford’s all-time digs leader with 1,358 digs in her career and there are still at least seven more matches left to play; inducted into the AVCA’s 30-Digs Club after her first record-breaking performance last season; named Ohio Valley Conference Defensive Player of the Week in the second week of voting last season.

Sounds like a pretty good resume to me, but what does she think?

“Being number one, all-time? That’s something that I never thought that I could actually do,” Gay said. “Thinking back on last year, and realizing what I actually did, it’s just weird to see how successful I was. Even though I’m not getting the numbers I did last year, that’s okay because with what we are doing, I’m pretty much doing all that I can right now and we have such a good offense and our serve-receive percentage is so high, that it’s still such a success.”

With Gay as a captain this year, the Bulldogs have broken even more records as a team. Samford surpassed the longest win streak by four wins this season as it won 12 consecutive matches. The Bulldogs still have the longest home win streak with 10 wins in the Pete Hanna Center, and are enjoying the best record the program has seen in its 21 years.

“I’m really excited that I’m a part of the team that has actually made a huge change in the program,” says Gay. “I’m glad that I’ve been a part of it all, from freshman year and not being very good to progressing to the first winning record last year to the success of my senior year. I just think if we win the conference, it will be the ultimate finish for all of us.”

The Bulldogs were picked to finish fourth in the North division of the Southern Conference and now lead the division in first place. They have the best overall record of all the teams in the conference and are tied for first place with College of Charleston.

Gay came into a freshman class of six, one of the largest classes the Bulldog program has seen in recent years. Of those six, four remain and one transfer has been added. The six-pack of youngsters joined a struggling team led by a coach starting her second year as a head coach and one senior, two juniors and two sophomores. The freshmen were automatically thrown into the mix and became immediate contributors in their first year of collegiate volleyball. Gay saw action in every match of her freshman year and has only missed one match since then.

“My freshman year was probably the biggest obstacle I’ve had to overcome or the biggest adjustment I’ve had to make,” Gay said. “Just jumping right into college volleyball and it being such a big transition already. All six of us freshmen were pretty much the entire team, and we were leading the way while knowing that there was a lot of pressure there already. We didn’t really have a big group of seniors to look up to and we had to really direct ourselves. That was really hard.”

Gay and her fellow classmen endured two long losing seasons. In her sophomore year, she was thrust into another foreign situation when setter Jackie Jaszcz was sidelined with a season-ending knee injury. The sophomore soon took on the role as setter for the first time and finished the season with 571 assists.

The challenge of taking on a new role seemed to expand Gay’s perspective of the game as well as her volleyball I.Q. The next season would be the record-breaking one for her and the most successful of her career so far, individually and as a team. The Bulldogs tabbed their first winning season in 2007 with a 16-13 record.

“I think it is why I’ve been a lot more successful the last two years,” Gay said. “I think now I fully understand why things happen and how each system works. Being on the other side of the ball, in that position, is a lot different. It’s still the same role, ultimately, you are still a huge part of the game and a huge leader but you are putting yourself in a different situation. I think it really did expand my knowledge of volleyball.”

The senior libero attributes most of her success to the support of her parents, Richard and Melinda. The pair travels large distances from Sarasota, Fla., to be present at almost every match and the two are some of the team’s biggest, and loudest, cheerleaders.

“I love that they come and see all my games,” says Gay. “I don’t know what they are going to do when I’m done playing. It helps a lot, knowing that they are always there to support me, even in my bad matches.”

Gay also says her teammates have been a huge part of her support system, especially this season.

“Everyone really gets along,” says Gay. “We have a completely different mentality this season and everyone supports each other. We are all legitimately friends, we hang out all the time, and I’m surprised that we haven’t gotten sick of each other already. We are literally always together and I think that is a part of our success too. No one is mad about not playing. Everyone gives their all in practice and is supportive about winning, and everyone is just as much a part of everything as everyone else.”

When all is said and done, Gay says she will miss her teammates the most. She also said she will miss playing.

“I’ve just been playing volleyball for so long that it’s just going to be weird to no have to go to practices and workouts and matches.”

Samford head coach Derek Schroeder said that Gay has become an emotional leader for the Bulldogs and in that role can be a part of leading this team to great things. Gay has her sights set on leading this team to great things as well. She has declared that she will not stop until her team has won a conference championship.

When asked was her greatest accomplishment at Samford was, she answered: “I don’t really want to answer that question until after the season is finally over. There is still a lot of volleyball to be played, but I think my greatest achievement will be when there is a ring on my finger in December after we win the conference championship.”

SENIOR SPOTLIGHT: Jackie Jaszcz

You Have To Take What Life Gives You

Jackie Jaszcz has been told that she is the best athlete in her family since her grandmother who was a professional track athlete. Her father played tennis and basketball in high school, but hung up is sneakers for a soundboard and speakers.

Jaszcz is the daughter of four-time Grammy-winning music engineer and producer, John Jaszcz. He has worked with gospel, country, R&B and jazz artists such as Kirk Franklin, Billy Ray Cyrus, Wynonna Judd, SONICFLOOD, Hezekiah Walker, John Michael Montgomery, George Clinton and Funkadelic. Being the daughter of such music industry figure, Jaszcz has had the chance to go to the Grammys and rub elbows with stars in the studios.

“The year he took our family to the Grammys two years ago was when he won his second one. And he won two more the year after that. That was really cool. It’s really fun having your dad do that because you get to go to all the studios and everything. We used to hang out with Billy Ray Cyrus when he used to work with him, but that’s like the most famous person I think I’ve met. He won the Grammy for Kirk Franklin so I met him then. He didn’t work with one of the Backstreet Boys but I got to meet him because he was at the studio that my dad was working at one time.”

Jaszcz started playing recreational volleyball in the fourth grade and fell in love with it.

“I really liked it and I got really good at it,” Jaszcz said. “I was always better than everyone else there. I don’t really know why. I guess I was just more athletic. It just grew on me and I started loving the game. It was so much fun for me because I was really good at it. I just kept going with it.”

She played on the varsity team while in high school, which led her to Samford. Jaszcz committed to play for the Bulldogs under second-year head coach Michelle Durban. She would be one of six freshmen joining the squad of one senior, two juniors and two sophomores. The newcomers outnumbered the veterans and became immediate contributors on the floor.

After her freshman season, Jaszcz ranked third on the single-season assists list with 1,245 and sixth on the all-time assists leaderboard. She was the sixth best setter in the Ohio Valley Conference, one of only three freshmen.

Her sophomore year looked promising, amassing almost half of her freshman year’s assist total by the 15th match of the year. The sophomore had totaled 503 digs so far, just over 10 digs a set. However, at the end of the first set in Samford’s match against Kennesaw State on Sept. 19, 2006, Jaszcz’s season came to a screeching halt as she hurt her knee coming down from a set.

“I pretty much landed really weird and went down and tore my ACL,” Jaszcz said. “It was the weirdest thing that has ever happened to me. I’ve never had any serious injury before.”

The Bulldogs had earned four wins prior to the Kennesaw State match. Samford defeated the Owls, 3-1, but were only able to get one more win after that.

“Having to sit there was hard,” Jaszcz said. “Especially that season. I was the only setter, so Courtney Gay had to come in and set. It was really hard to watch your team crumble in a way. I think after that I tried really hard to support my team because I knew it was going to be really hard for me to come back.”

Jaszcz was sidelined for the rest of the season but worked relentlessly to get back into shape for the next season.

“The next season, it was definitely a huge struggle for me because I was just hurting all of the time,” Jaszcz said. “You had to push through and still support your team, even though you know you’re not going to play the same. You know, you’re body is just not the same. It was still fun just being part of the team though. Then, towards the middle and end of the season, I started to feel like my body was getting back to what it used to be.”

Jaszcz was able to play in three matches during the 2007 season – at home against Tennessee Tech and on the road at Morehead State and Eastern Kentucky. However, during this past spring’s workouts, she injured her knee again and had to endure another surgery and recovery process. In retrospect, Jaszcz says that she has just learned that “you have to take what life gives you. Everything happens for a reason.”

Through it all, Jaszcz has continued to concentrate on her education. The journalism and mass communications major has centered in on broadcast journalism. She says she wants to get her master’s degree in communication and continue to gain experience so she can eventually move into on-camera work. The senior will graduate from Samford in May with a bachelor’s degree in journalism and mass communication.

More excitement comes for Jaszcz this summer as she will get married to former Samford basketball standout Travis Peterson in June in her hometown of Franklin, Tenn. The couple will then move overseas to Europe where Peterson will continue his professional basketball career. Jaszcz hopes to pursue her master’s degree overseas as well.

Jaszcz says that what she will miss most about Samford is her friends and being part of the Samford volleyball team. The squad has become such great friends, a family, even.

“I think the reason why we are all so close is because we’ve all gone through everything together,” Jaszcz said. “We’ve all invested so much into this program. We’ve been through the worst times and now we’ve been through the best times together. I think we’ve just grown to be really great friends. I can’t even describe it. It’s one of the reasons that has kept me engaged in everything. As much I have been away off the court, it’s so great to have your best friends there around you all of the time.”

Like the others, her most memorable moment will have been the 2008 season.

“This whole season has been a great memory,” Jaszcz said. “Just seeing everyone really come together and play as a team and really work so hard is so great. Not that we haven’t worked hard in the past, it is just a different vibe this year and it’s really awesome to be able to be a part of that.

It feels awesome to top off my career with a season like this. Seriously, since I got here my freshman year, there were six freshmen, and all we talked about that whole time was when we are seniors, we are going to be awesome. We are going to win everything. And it just feels so good to be able to say that now. Even though I can’t play, I’m still a part of it. And it’s awesome to be able to see it happen.”

SENIOR SPOTLIGHT: Kirstein Sosnowski

There's No Other Way To Finish

Senior middle blocker Kirstein Sosnowski is probably the least experienced senior Bulldog on the 2008 roster but she has made a huge impact on Samford’s success this season.

Sosnowski did not start playing volleyball until her freshman year in high school, unlike her fellow teammates who have been playing since they were eight or nine years old. Before she took up volleyball, she was kicking a soccer ball around outdoors.

“I didn’t start playing volleyball until I was a freshman in high school and I was on the freshman team,” Sosnowski said. “After that, I moved to varsity. I wish I would have started earlier, but I loved it. Basically the coach just said, “Hey, come try out for volleyball and I’m glad he did. I just fell in love with it. Before that, I played soccer. I’m a little tall for soccer.”

The daughter of a Marine who played baseball and participated in track, Sosnowski was destined to become an athlete. However, her mother was a cheerleader who passed a little bit of her “spirit” on to her daughter as well.

Sosnowski is one of the biggest cheerleaders on the team. You can almost hear her encouraging words over the crowd after each point. She cheers on her teammates, whether she is on the court or on the bench, and you can see how each player feeds off of that encouragement from a senior leader.

The senior family studies major is one of two children in her family. She is the older sister to a brother who is a senior in high school who plays basketball but whose passion is music. She says she enjoys being a part of a team with younger girls because it gives her a chance to have younger sisters.

“I’ve always wanted sisters,” Sosnowski said. “I really do feel like I kind of take on the older sister role. I know they look up to me. If they have a bad day, I just talk to them and tell them that I’ve been there too and that they will get through it. I just try to make them smile and let them know they are important and that they are part of the team and that we are always going to be there for them.”

Sosnowski speaks from experience. She came into a situation unlike this year’s freshmen did. With five other newcomers by her side, she joined a team that had not been very successful in recent years and was in a situation in which the freshmen outnumbered the rest of the team. She and her fellow classmen were thrust immediately into the intense game of collegiate volleyball and as a result, had to grow up quickly. The growth process has continued through this year for Sosnowski and her teammates, which is proven by the team’s success.

“With age, you mature more. The same with volleyball I.Q.,” Sosnowski said. “Dex is always talking about volleyball I.Q., and that’s how we are going to beat teams. We have been given this opportunity this year, and honestly, this past year, I feel like I’ve grown the most. My confidence has gotten back to where it used to be. As far as playing goes, there’s just a different feeling because we aren’t so tentative. It’s a different environment completely. It’s back to being competitive and fun, and that’s what I live for.”

Last season, the volleyball team was given the honor of playing the first athletic event in the new Pete Hanna Center. Looking back, it seemed as sort of a sign of the times. The Bulldogs wrapped up their first winning season in a brand new facility and soon a brand new start came for the squad. With a coaching change came continued success and the Bulldogs began setting higher standards than before and setting new records. Sosnowski says the whole experience has been the one thing she will remember most.

“I really liked playing in the Pete Hanna Center for the first time last season, but honestly, my most memorable moment has been this whole season. It’s been such a big turn-around and you know, we couldn’t ask for a better way to go out than like this.”

The 2008 season has definitely been the most successful for the senior middle blocker. She has played in every match for the Bulldogs this season, knocking down 2.61 kills per set while leading the Bulldogs in hitting with a .363 average. She has had 63 total blocks so far this season and is currently tied for fifth on the all-time block assists list for Samford. For the past few weeks, she has also been ranked among the nation’s top 50 in hitting percentage by the NCAA.

The dynamic of the Samford volleyball team is unlike any other. They are a close, knit team. Like a family. When asked why she thought the team was so close and if that contributed to the team’s success, Sosnowski had this to say:

“When Ellen (Samford’s strength and conditioning coach) came here, she kind of changed the mentality of the team. We got a whole lot tougher. We had to be tougher. One thing she said is that you are only as strong as your weakest player. And that really has, in a sense, made us realize that we are a part of a team, even if you are not playing. You are still part of a team and you are a part of our success. I feel like we have been given the opportunity to realize that we can be successful. Our confidence has gone up because we’ve gotten a lot more support. The environment and the people and the chemistry, it’s all there.”

When Sosnowski is done playing, she said she will not be done with the game altogether. She said she is not exactly sure what she wants to do with her family studies degree yet, but she knows that she wants to pursue a master’s degree and coach club volleyball.

When asked how it feels to top off her senior season with such a great season, Sosnowski responded with a resounding, “There is no other way to finish!”

(Kirstein finished her senior year accomplishing probably her biggest goal to date. She earned a place on the All-Conference Second Team and was a part of the 2008 SoCon North Division Championship team.)

SENIOR SPOTLIGHT: Sara Sears

The Heart Of A Competitor

Samford senior outside hitter Sara Sears is a self-proclaimed competitor. She says she’s always been good at sports and had never had a losing season in anything until she got to college.

Since her freshman year, Sears has been an integral part of the Samford volleyball team. For her first two years, the outside hitter played in every set of every match. After her freshman year, she ranked at the top of the single-season attempts list (1,199) and seventh on the single-season kills list (426).

After her sophomore season, she held two spots on the single-season attempts list – number one with 1,199 in 2005 and number six with 1,082 in 2006 – and was still ranked seventh on the single-season kills list with 426 in 2005. In the second to last match of her junior season season, against Eastern Kentucky, the first match played in the Pete Hanna Center, Sears entered the Samford 1,000 Kills Club with her first kill of the match on the third play of the match. She is one of only six former Bulldogs who are members of this prestigious club.

Sears now ranks third on the all-time kills list and second on the all-time attempts list. She holds three spots on the single-season attempts list – first with 1,199 in 2005, sixth with 1,082 in 2006 and eight with 1,044 in 2007.

Sears has played sports all of her life. She started playing basketball in second grade and volleyball in fourth grade. Her family has always been extremely involved in her sports life, her father coaching her in basketball and her mother coaching her in volleyball.

The two sports were always her favorites, never picking one over the other. But when it became time to choose, Sears knew she had a better chance to play volleyball in college. A school change was a must for her if she wanted to be noticed, so in high school, she moved to Bayside Academy while also playing for the Eastern Shore Volleyball Club. Bayside Academy’s varsity volleyball team has earned 14 school titles and won its seventh consecutive 2A state championship in eight years in 2005.

Sears caught the eye of former Samford head coach Michelle Durban during her senior season and Durban quickly recruited her to play at Samford. Sears joined five other freshmen as the largest recruiting class Samford volleyball has seen in recent years, a class that outnumbered its veteran players.

Sears and her teammates worked hard for three years, seeing their blood, sweat and tears produce nothing compared to their goals. Finally in her junior season, the Bulldogs boasted the first winning season in Samford volleyball’s 21 years, a 16-13 record. Now, as a senior, and with a new coaching staff, the girls are enjoying a record-breaking season, the best-ever season for the program.

With a win over Chattanooga in the Pete Hanna Center on Oct. 29, 2008, the Samford volleyball team notched the most wins for a Bulldog squad in the history of the program. And there are still three more weeks of volleyball to be played.

“Getting back to having that winning season is really great,” Sears said. “We’ve all worked so hard. Especially our class, coming in, and we saw it building and building and nothing ever came of it. We’ve always had so much talent but nothing ever came of it. And now finally, we all saw it turn over, and there is a big change in the mentality, and now we are actually seeing results from all of our hard work. It’s finally paying off.”

Through all of the ups and downs of her volleyball career, Sears has had lots of support surrounding her. Former coaches and friends from home have been a part of her support system, but Sears says she could not have done anything without the support of her parents and family. The Sears family is present at most, if not all, Samford volleyball matches.

“They are everything to me. I honestly don’t know what I would do if they weren’t here,” Sears said.

When Sears came to Samford, she was torn between two majors. The artist in her wanted to concentrate on graphic design but the athlete in her was curious about the medical field. Sears finally decided to major in fitness and health promotion.

During the last summer, Sears interned with the Lakeshore Foundation, the local Olympic and Paralympic Training Site. She worked closely with members on a day-to-day basis and helped with camps being run by the organization.

“I loved it,” Sears said. “It was awesome. I met so many cool people. The people that work there are awesome and then the people that are actually members there are awesome. A couple of people there I became really good friends with and I still keep in touch with. Two of them went to the Paralympics this year.

“I never really knew what to expect. The whole atmosphere is amazing. It was really humbling too. You go there and see people working really hard and are happy about life. They have really accepted everything about their life, and then you go back to school and hear people complain about stuff that is not even worth it at all. It just really puts things in perspective.”

Sears said that she is not really sure what she wants to do with her degree right now. She says she is thinking about going to occupational therapy school or becoming an emergency medical technician for a while. Either way, she wants to help and serve other people.

It is not surprising that the thing self-proclaimed competitor while miss most when she is gone is the competitive atmosphere.

“I’m going to miss being part of a team and all the hard work that goes into it,” Sears said. “Just knowing that all the sweat and tears was going toward the same goal.”

(Sara is also Harry Connick, Jr.'s cousin, which I find quite fascinating. HCJ is my favorite. He came to practice one day but I, unfortunately, wasn't there due to family business.)