North Carolina State University Athletics
Megan's Report: Spring Season #2
3/14/2011 12:00:00 AM | Women's Volleyball
March 14, 2011
Spring break has officially begun and the coaches gave us all a nice surprise at Thursday’s practice by giving us the Friday off before break. The coaches felt that our continually improvement and dedication to working hard on the court and in the weight room needed to be recognized. It was nice to know that the coaches felt we deserved a little surprise!
Team practices are well under way and they have been going pretty well. It is difficult at times because of the small number of girls (10) we have practicing but with the practice plans that the coaches have designed, we barely notice the shortage of bodies. Every practice usually begins with a lot of ball control drills that have specific goals we must reach before moving on.
After our voices and bodies are warmed up we usually divide onto the two courts and do position specific work. Coach Pete Hoyer usually takes the middles and myself to work on blocking and improving the middle connection. Coach Stevie Mussie works with the outsides and passers on the other court while Coach Bryan Bunn oversees both courts and provides feedback to us all. To end practice, we set up one court and spend the rest of the time competing against each other in game-like drills. This is probably my favorite part of practice because we get to apply what we have been working on individually into our team play.
Our focus this past week and for the rest of spring training is having a “single-minded purpose”. Each day we must enter the gym with one thing in mind… volleyball. We must have one goal in mind and that is to get better. Whether it is passing the ball to target, serving the ball to a specific area, or making that shot; we must be focused on one thing at a time and not let outside distractions or thoughts creep into our minds. By focusing solely on volleyball for the two to three hours that we are in the gym we are setting ourselves up for a very successful spring season and upcoming fall.
This week will be a nice break for us to re-energize and spend some time away from volleyball before we start the second half of our spring season.
