“Well, it’s actually kind of like a family.”

Junior Brianna Alford has only been playing volleyball since freshman year, at 14 years old, but she already loves the sport more than any other one she’s ever played.

Alford says it was a bit hard to learn at first, but that she had really good coaches, making it a lot easier for her to not only learn the sport, but also find a passion for it. She also says that the girls who were there before she was were really friendly to her and didn’t try to act as if she was an outsider just because she was the new girl.

She also plays softball, but says she doesn’t like it nearly as much as she loves to play volleyball. “There’s just something about volleyball that I love; it’s definitely my favorite sport, hands down. I love the feeling I get when we first walk onto the courts. It just gives the most amazing rush, and I’m always ready to get my game on.”

Alford says she doesn’t really have anyone who inspired her to play volleyball, just that when she was in school it sounded interesting to her, so she tried it. She says that it made her a little nervous when she went in for their very first practice, because there were people there who were veterans and had already been playing since they were little kids, and here she was for her first go at it.

She explains that in order to play volleyball, you need to be really dedicated, because it is so much more than just hitting a ball back and forth. She says that you do get a little bruised up every once in a while diving for the ball, and you do have sore arms do to hitting as it hard as you possibly can, but that if it was just as simple as hitting a ball, what would be the fun in that?