Life as a Georgia Peach

I have now been a pseudo-resident in the state of Georgia for almost two months. Most of my time has been spent wearing Nike shorts, one of my many “Georgia volleyball” team-issued t-shirts and sneakers – nothing of which is too out of my character. Incorporating red and black into my wardrobe required no real effort, due to my previous college volleyball experience at University of Tampa (also red and black). Since many of you are as new to Georgia volleyball as I was, I have provided a “cast of characters” to try to help you, my faithful readers, sort out who’s who.

Name - Description

Lizzy Stemke - Head coach; She’s my boss; married to Kevin, mother of Kerrigan

Josh Lauer - Asst coach; married to Deb, father of Eli

Colleen “Neels” Bayer - Asst coach; married to Dave, mother of Max, Ben, and Sam

Matt “Huskey” Huskey - Volunteer; lives with the Lauer family

Laura Welch - Director of Operations                       

Trina Topping - Athletic Trainer GA; my roommate on all team trips

Vanessa & Megan - Athletic trainer undergrads

Matt, D, & Keenan - Student managers for the team

Trina and me at the airport

Some of the Dawgs sending up their love 

In addition to the above-mentioned individuals, we have the Dawgs themselves; Bri & Choi are our lone seniors, followed by underclassmen Britt, Allie, Stacey, Elena, Lauren, Chloe, Tirah, Gaby, Jasmine, Maggie, Kaylee, Des, and Megan. The team plays in the volleyball arena, which is located inside the Ramsey Student Center. 

My job as video coordinator entails setting up video recording for all practices and matches, taking Data Volley statistics during practices and matches, and Data Volley statistics of scouted matches for upcoming opponents. 

Data Volley set-up at FSU

Due to everyone up until this point in their season competing in tournaments (meaning at least 3 matches per team per weekend), I’ve had quite a lot of Data Volleying. Luckily regular conference matches have begun, so we are going to only be scouting for two teams per weekend. Not to mention we have traveled for THREE consecutive weekends, stayed in 4 hotels, been on 3 flights, in addition to travel via charter buses. It’s becoming quite problematic to remember which hotel we’re staying at, and which key goes to the door.

Thus far in our season, we’ve hosted the Bulldog Invitational (vs GA Southern, GA State, Troy and Slovenian National team), traveled to Florida State (vs FSU, FAMU, and FIU), traveled to Michigan State (vs Albany, IPFW, and Michigan State), and traveled to SEC opponents South Carolina and Mississippi State.

[note: matches in BOLD are wins, matches in ITALICS are losses – aka we are 7-4]

We are hosting Alabama and Arkansas this upcoming weekend (September 21^st and 23^rd, respectively). Check out our schedule HERE! If you want to watch the Alabama or Arkansas matches online click HERE then select SPORT tab and click on Women's Volleyball to view our videos.