One Step At a Time

“I didn't think I would ever want to coach girls, I wanted to coach football or boys basketball when I first got out of college because that's all I knew at the time. For three years I was a [volleyball] coach at Highland Community College. [Although] I first started coaching [volleyball] almost 30 years ago while being a math teacher at the same time for the first 19 of them. [But] there was one year I took off and didn’t coach. It was after we won the state championship. I coached one more year [after that], and I was kind of getting burnt out, so I just took a year off and refereed [as well as] coached a club team. That following year the lady that took the job decided she didn’t want it anymore, and they asked if I wanted it back. I said yep, i'll take it back. I started getting burnout in the classroom [but] I still wanted to stay in education because I still wanted to coach. 12 years ago I started looking into counseling and started taking classes at K-State. I think since I’ve started counseling, I’ve gained the ability to help someone that is struggling on and off the court or even with the mental aspects of the game. It's interesting, because I think it's made me a better coach. The sport volleyball is more than just a sport to me. It’s the relationships. I love being around the players and building that special bond with them. I love the competition, the challenges, seeing people have success, the excitement of our team when we fight through a hard match and we come out on top. I even love the practice even though I know some people aren’t very fond of them all the time. To me, those are times as a team we share together, nobody else gets to share that. I’ve found out good teams don’t always have to be the best hitters, or best passers, [but] they have to be able to share the good and bad times, the highs and lows, and most importantly be patient. Good things take time so just remember to enjoy the journey and the ride along with it. You have to remember to be open to possibilities, you never know what doors are going to open, and you just have to be willing to take that chance.”