Beginning Today At The WRAC, LIU Brooklyn Volleyball Thinks Big!

Opening the home portion of their 2013 schedule today against Cornell in the Blackbird Invitational Volleyball Tournament, the LIU Brooklyn women’s volleyball team is committed to improving on the abrupt ending to last year’s campaign.

In a season of historic accomplishments, including a perfect conference mark (18-0) in capturing the 2012 Northeast Conference (NEC) title, the Blackbirds hit a major stumbling block at last year’s NCAA Women’s Volleyball tournament.

Playing their first round match in legendary Pauley Pavilion against reigning champion UCLA, the Blackbirds were overmatched by a Bruins’ team fielding a front line of Tabi Love (6 foot 5), Rachael Kidder (6 foot 3) and Zoë Nightingale (6 foot 3). LIU, whose tallest player on the court that night was 6 foot 1 senior Jessica Rice, was simply overmatched, dropping a 3-0 decision to their hosts that was not that close.

This year the Blackbirds plan to end their season on a decidedly higher note.

With the addition of dynamic newcomers Sandy Zhao and Nicole Okeke, and with Rice, Vera Djuric, Annika Foit, Tamara Ignjic and Adriana Vinas Joy all returning from one of LIU’s best-ever squads, the 2013 Blackbirds are poised to be the most successful in the program’s two-decade history.

Thanks to yet another strong recruiting class, LIU “has all the pieces to be the best team ever,” said head coach Kyle Robinson. Now entering his sixth season directing Blackbird volleyball, Coach Robinson believes the this year’s team can advance further than any other LIU team ever has, including a trip to the second round of the NCAA tournament for the first time ever.

Beginning at 4:30 p.m. today in the Steinberg Wellness Center, local fans will get the opportunity to see the current LIU squad in action. Now in its eighth year, the Blackbird Invitational—featuring local northeast powerhouses Colgate (2012 Patriot Division winner) and Fairfield (2012 MAAC champion)—will offer their host stiff competition.

Foit, the reigning NEC Player of the Year, Djuric (2011 and 2012 NEC Setter of the Year) and Mia Radisic are all member of LIU’s class of 2015, considered one of the most successful recruiting classes in program history… until the following year’s class, which yielded sophomores Ignjic, a 2012 first-team All-Northeast Conference selection, key contributor Mirjana Rajic, and Vinas Joy, the reigning NEC defensive player of the year.

Now there’s the class of 2017.

At 6 foot 3 with skill, size and experience, Sandy Zhao is one of three of new Blackbirds that Robinson hopes will mesh with a successful core to propel LIU into the upper echelon of NCAA Division 1 competition. A middle blocker from Beijing—first identified almost two years ago when Robinson was an assistant coach on a U.S. national team that toured the People’s Republic of China—Zhao represents a new breed of LIU volleyball player.

“I’d never really experienced the training, the discipline and the nuances of the Asian style of volleyball, which is a much faster, sharper and crisper game,” explained Robinson about his 2012 trip to Asia. “If we can adapt that style and morph it to what we do, we put ourselves in a realm that our girls have never seen, our opponents have never seen.”

Nicole Okeke, a redshirt sophomore who transferred from Central Arkansas, has already had a distinct impact on Blackbird fortunes. According to Robinson, Okeke “may be the most physically talented player we have on our team.”

Robinson expects Zhao, Okeke and local freshman Nicole Hopton to be key contributors to LIU’s line-up. Along with the continued improvement of Jessica Rice, now in her fourth year, the Blackbirds have the size and skill in the middle that have been lacking in years past.

The progress this season is already apparent.

Two weeks ago at the Campus USA Credit Union Invitational in Gainesville Florida, LIU stunned host Florida in the third set, rallying from 23-18 down en route to a 26-24 win. Even though the Blackbirds ultimately dropped the match three sets to one, their resilience and ability against the 9th-ranked Gators, who last season advanced to the Sweet 16 of the NCAA Tournament before falling to eventual national champion Texas, suggests LIU has the ability to reach new heights of success.

On A Course For The NCAAs Unless…

So, who can stop the Blackbirds from repeating as NEC champs and making their mark in the 2013 NCAA tournament? Perhaps, only the Blackbirds themselves—that’s how talented Robinson thinks this year’s team could be.

Picked again to be the NEC’s best team, and with seven conference titles over the past ten years, LIU clearly has enjoyed long-term success in their conference. If the Blackbirds hope to be recognized as an emerging volleyball power, they must compete against the top teams in the country. Later this month LIU will travel to Oklahoma for the Nike Invitational, where they will play Oklahoma and Tulsa, two the nation’s elite squads.

According to Coach Robinson, wins and loses don’t tell the full story.

“If we were just about winning we could play a lot of less-skilled teams and win,” said Robinson in a recent interview. That’s why our goals are really about us, about what we’re doing. We show up at the gym and work hard to be the best volleyball players we can be. We want to play great volleyball and we want to have longevity as a program.”

LIU will enter conference play on September 28 against rising power Bryant. Given his team’s recent success, Robinson knows NEC opponents have LIU circled on their schedules, looking to knock the Blackbirds off their perch.

Home and away matches against rivals Robert Morris (second in the NEC Preseason Coaches Poll), Central Connecticut (third) and Sacred Heart (fourth), along with an improving St. Francis Brooklyn squad means the Blackbirds will need to stay focused to qualify for the NEC’s automatic NCAA tournament berth.

“It’d be foolish of me to predict that we’re going to win the conference and we’re going to take a few sets (in the NCAA tournament),” said Robinson, who with 96 wins is within 11 victories of becoming the winningest coach in LIU volleyball history. “But, we have all the tools to be one of the most successful Blackbird teams in history.”