The roll of African American's in NCAA volleyball

[valeixo888]

Ok, this may be extremely stereotypical. But why is that most black volleyball players are huge blockers or hitters, rather than setters or defensive players?

For defensive specialists, I can only think of Allison Anderson of BC and Navy had a black libero

And for setters, Alisha Glass of Penn St and Jill Robinson of Miami.

I know Tara Cross was a heck of defensive player...but who else?

[BeiBei]

Salima Davidson another AA setter from PSU

[Phaedrus]

University of Georgia has a great freshman this year who is a setter, Nikki Hawkins. She hasn't done anything yet but she is incredibly athletic even though she is short.

[Gorf]

Michelle Jaworski another AA setter for PSU - she's 2nd on the NCAA all time assists list.

She was their setter in 1990 where they entered the NCAA tournament 42-0, beat Purdue and Wisconsin in the tournament before losing to Nebraska at Lincoln. They finished ranked 6th in the country. The next season they joined the Big Ten.

[gobigred]

Niji Nammni (sp?) at Stanford was a defensive specialist, I think.

[Deleted]

Where are they rolling?

[LowVBIQ]

ruffda said:

Where are they rolling?

Excellent. I hereby deputize you.

[BearClause]

Jalen Pendon at Washington State was the starting libero last year.

wsucougars.cstv.com/sports/w-volley/mtt/pendon_jalen00.html



Historically Candace McNamee set at Cal and Robyn Lewis at Stanford.

[BearClause]

ruffda said:

Where are they rolling?

Well - I guess the grammar cop citation is for using "roll" when it's "role". The puncuation cop citation is for the unnecessary apostrophe in "African American's".

[kj18]

Florida had an African American setter in the 90s named Nikki Shade I think? I can't remember if that was her name or not, but I'm sure there are Florida fans who know who I am talking about...feel free to correct me if I'm wrong. She was really athletic and ran a nice offense for the Gators.

[baywatcher]

Robyn Lewis set Stanford to a championship back around the turn of the century. If memory serves, she was black. Remember seeing clips of her doing a great job and noting she was African American. The broader question is what can be done to get more African American girls involved in volleyball, which I'm sure has been discussed ad nauseum on this site.

[Wolfgang]

Nikk Hubbert of Hawaii was African-American. She was the last great UH setter before Kanoe and after Ah Mow.

[foreignball]

None of the above posts answers the initial question, though....

[BearClause]

foreignball said:

None of the above posts answers the initial question, though....

Well - I think there were names given to state that the perception wasn't necessarily true. I've seen plenty of shorter players (of all ethnic backgrounds) who played VB at the DS position. Here's another example.

smcgaels.cstv.com/sports/w-volley/mtt/thompson_erin00.html

[FloridaPerson]

Nikki Shade, former UF setter and current Associate Head Coach at USF, host of the 2009 NCAA Volleyball Final Four.