Queens of the beach

September 10, 2010
       
Playing high school volleyball against teams from Frederick County and West Virginia's Eastern Panhandle is certainly no day at the beach.

Playing beach volleyball? Well, that's not really a whole lot easier.

But for James Wood sophomores Kelby Jackson and Emilee Payne, a day spent playing volleyball on the scorching sand of Virginia Beach at the end of last month proved to be a worthwhile experience.

Competing on the beach for the first time, the Colonels' duo won a two-on-two tournament that featured other high school students as well as adult women at the site of the 49th annual East Coast Surfing Championships on Aug. 28.

Their prize included a pair of new volleyballs, but the true reward was a boost to their skill sets and confidence heading into their first varsity season. "I think it helps [for six-on-six indoor volleyball] because you have to have more court awareness, and you need to move faster," said Jackson, who is Wood's starting libero this season. "Some teams would play deep, and some teams would play short. You have to kind of figure that out once you start playing them and see what their weaknesses are."

Neither Jackson nor Payne - a setter - are big hitters, so they relied on their teamwork and placement to finish 7-2 against mostly teams more accustomed to the beach game.

"We were the only group of teams entering the tournament in that division that weren't from Virginia Beach," said James Wood volleyball coach Jill Lester, who had two other pairs of girls from her squad enter the event. "A lot of people down there, that's their culture, to go out and play beach volleyball on the weekend. So, it was kind of fun to be from Winchester, Va., and go down and kick butt at beach volleyball."

The beach tournament was the second part of a weekend trip that included full-team indoor scrimmages against Group AAA schools Kellam and Salem the previous night.

After that, James Wood's players quickly realized that playing on the beach isn't as easy as it looks on TV.

"It's a lot harder, because the sand is very hard to jump in, and it's really hot, but it was a really awesome experience," Payne said. "You have to be able to talk a lot more, and communicate, and know who's going where."

Lester got an assist in helping the girls battle the blisters that developed on their feet from playing on the sun-baked sand.

The coach had two pairs of socks in her bag that she leant to Jackson and Payne, which ultimately may have helped them defeat Wood teammates Rachel Rau and Cate Beach in the elimination round. (Rau and Beach earned the top seed after winning all four of their group matches.)

"We started placing some bets on who was going to come out on top, and I told them I had [Payne and Jackson], because I had given them my socks," Lester joked.

Along with the competition, the trip served as a team-building experience for the Colonels, who have started the high school season 4-1.

And Lester thinks it could lead to some of her girls deciding to play beach volleyball more seriously.

Earlier this year, the NCAA approved the addition of "sand volleyball" to its list of emerging sports for women, meaning that it could soon become a scholarship sport at universities.

"There are a number of schools that are introducing it this year, and the schools don't necessarily have to be beach schools - some of them are bringing in sand," Lester said. "So I keep telling my players ... if [six-on-six] is not for you and you want to check out the beach scene, you can get a scholarship and go on to play beach volleyball."

That wasn't the Colonels' objective in Virginia Beach, but in terms of opening their eyes to a different variation of the sport, the trip proved to be a success.

"I definitely liked playing on the beach," Jackson said. "It was a lot of fun, and it's just a good opportunity. I think a lot of players should do it."

- David Selig is sports editor at The Winchester Star