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College athletes have more influence on younger athletes than they sometimes realize. A kid at a camp may remember what a college athlete said to them years after the athlete has forgotten the conversation ever happened. Younger players watch how college athletes compete, communicate, respond to coaches, treat teammates, handle mistakes, and carry themselves when nobody is asking for an autograph or taking a picture. That kind of influence creates an incredible opportunity fo

I've witnessed my fair share of teams lose matches they probably should've won. Sometimes they underestimate an opponent, sometimes execution falls apart, sometimes preparation wasn't good enough, and sometimes a team walks into a match believing talent alone is going to take care of business. Joshua 7 records Israel suffering a shocking defeat against Ai after the much larger victory at Jericho, but if we're going to use that story in athletics, we have to be careful because

Finding the balance between showing Christ's love and not allowing everybody else's opinion to control you can be hard for Christian coaches and athletes. We want to represent Christ well, we want people to see something different in the way we live, and if we're being honest, most of us still care what people think about us. I know I've felt that tension myself because criticism can sting, rejection can get in your head, and being misunderstood can make you want to defend yo

College coaches spend a ridiculous amount of time developing skills that athletes eventually won't use anymore. We teach footwork, technique, positioning, speed, strength, decision making, and every tiny detail that might help somebody become a better player, but eventually every athlete plays their last match. When that happens, I want the people I've coached to walk away with a whole lot more than a better serve or a higher vertical. That's where I think coaches have a resp

Self reflection is one of those things everybody says is important, but it doesn't accomplish much if all we're doing is sitting around thinking about ourselves. Real self reflection requires enough honesty to look at our habits, motives, reactions, priorities, and choices without immediately defending everything we find. Athletes spend hours watching film because you can't fix what you're unwilling to see, and I think we should be willing to turn that same camera on ourselve

Young athletes have grown up with instant access to almost everything. You can send a message in seconds, FaceTime somebody across the country, look up an answer immediately, post something for hundreds of people to see, and communicate with teammates without ever being in the same room. Technology isn't automatically the enemy, and social media isn't automatically bad either. It can help young people stay connected, find community, learn, and support each other, but there's

Athletes love the phrase “all in.” Coaches use it constantly because we know exactly what it looks like when somebody is committed and exactly what it looks like when they're halfway in. You can see it in how an athlete trains when nobody is watching, how they respond when practice gets hard, whether they take coaching when they don't like what they're hearing, and whether they're still putting in the work when the results aren't coming fast enough. For a Christian athlete, t

Most athletes will obsess over every rep in the weight room but grab whatever's fastest to eat between class and practice, and they'll skip rest entirely if given the choice. That's backwards, and the physiology backs that up. The body doesn't actually get stronger during a workout, it gets stronger during the recovery that follows it. That single fact should change how we think about training. If you want athletes who keep improving over a full season instead of breaking dow

Ever heard the phrase, “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger?” Nietzsche and Kelly Clarkson were both onto something, although I’m guessing Nietzsche didn’t expect his philosophy to eventually become a pop song. In athletics, weakness isn’t always a bad thing. Sometimes the areas where you struggle are exactly where the most growth needs to happen. The key is being honest enough to identify those weaknesses and disciplined enough to work on them instead of hiding them, ma

As spring turns to summer, college life changes pretty quickly. NARPs, or what athletes jokingly call “non athletic regular people,” are thinking about summer jobs, vacations, internships, and having a little more freedom. For college volleyball players, summer looks a little different. Preseason comes fast, and what you do during those months matters. Summer is also one of those times when coaches learn a lot about their athletes without actually being around them every day.

As a college coach, I know firsthand how much pressure and stress competition can bring for college athletes. When so much of your time, identity, and energy are tied to your sport, it’s easy to let the result of a game determine how you feel about yourself. Faith gives athletes something bigger to stand on. Their purpose doesn’t change because they played poorly, lost a starting spot, made a mistake, or walked off the court after a loss. During competition, I encourage athle

The transfer portal, one of the biggest developments in modern college sports, has completely reshaped how student-athletes move between institutions. Since the NCAA changed its rules, athletes can now transfer multiple times without losing a season of eligibility, not just once, the way the rule originally worked. Combined with a windowed system that sets specific dates for entering the portal sport by sport, and a newer age-based eligibility model, movement between programs

Today's post looks at the parable Jesus tells in Matthew 21:28-32, and the message underneath it: sincerity matters more than saying the right words or making promises you don't keep. It's a parable about actions outweighing words, and about what's actually in someone's heart mattering more than what comes out of their mouth. That lesson lands hard on a college volleyball team, where a player's actions and her actual commitment to the goal are what determine whether the team

Working with college athletes means constantly balancing two things: treating them like the adults they technically are, while still recognizing they're in the middle of real, ongoing social and biological development. Young people often struggle with emotional awareness and communication, and that struggle shows up everywhere, in family relationships, academics, mental health, dating, time management, even their spirituality. A mentor's job is to give them room to actually e

Madison “Maddie” Schonberg, a Junior outside hitter on the Centenary College Volleyball team, wrote this article. Maddie is from Harbor...

As young athletes progress from youth to high school to college-level performance, a fundamental question arises: Does recognition earned through hard work and dedication yield better results than awards given for mere participation? While both approaches can lead to successful athletic careers, their impact on athletes' mentality and skill development varies significantly. This post will explore the effects of earning notoriety versus receiving participation awards on young

A quick note before we dive in: I'm not a psychologist or a mental health professional. Everything here comes from my own observations as a coach who's worked with athletic teams for a long time. Drama Llamas. Drama Mamas. Attention seekers, drama queens, pot stirrers, instigators. We've all heard the names, and most of us have coached, played alongside, or led a teammate who fit one of them at some point. How do we actually understand these people, as coaches, leaders, and t

Coach Hard Love Harder comes down to finding the real balance between empathy and tough love. It's about pushing athletes toward their maximum potential while genuinely caring about their wellbeing the whole time. That means setting real standards for individual growth and team performance, giving honest feedback, and challenging players to actually reach their ceiling. It also means building real unity and camaraderie, and being there for your team with real emotional suppor

Over the past two decades, youth sports have become more competitive than ever. What used to center on learning the game, developing skills, and just enjoying the experience has shifted hard toward year-round competition, rankings, and winning. A lot of young athletes now grow up believing every game, every tournament, every season is another shot to impress a college coach and land a scholarship. Alongside that pressure has come a real spike in the cost of participation. Eli

Being a parent (step-parent) and coaching college athletics are both genuinely enriching, and both demand patience, dedication, and real hard work. At the core, they're the same job in a lot of ways: building an environment where growth and learning can actually happen. That takes being well organized, handling hard moments with grace and common sense, and staying current on what kids and athletes actually need developmentally. Communication holds it all together. Keep expect