Stonerook: A new beginning

Lopes View provides GCU's student-athletes a platform to express their lives through stories within their sport, academic studies and community outreach.

GCU women's volleyball player, Leigh Stonerook, talks about being a part of the new era of GCU Volleyball heading into head coach,Tim Nollan's first season leading the Lopes.

LEIGH STONEROOK / WOMEN'S VOLLEYBALL

A s a 22-year old senior on the GCU women's indoor volleyball team, I have been playing volleyball for 11 years, attended two different universities, been coached by three different collegiate coaching staffs and called 46 different women teammates at one point in my collegiate career. I have met a lot of knowledgeable people that have influenced me greatly, but one thing that has stuck with me was something my setting coach here at GCU, Jay Van Vark, said this past Spring within his first week on the job. He told us that, "Every year, at the conclusion of a team's season that team dies. Never again will that team exist in the same way it had the year before." When he said this I thought I understood the basic idea of his statement. Athletes graduate, suffer an injury or take a path that leads them away from the sport… all things I had seen over the past four years.

It wasn't until a couple weeks ago at the beginning of preseason that I started to fully grasp the entirety of my coach's statement. I began to understand that teams are not just a combination of gifted athletes and talented coaches. There's more to it than that. There is a culture and identity that exists within each team that gets reborn and built upon every year.

August 8, 2016 marked the beginning of the new GCU women's volleyball team. In addition to the fresh faces in Antelope Gym, there is a completely different culture being built upon every day in practice, in the weight room and in the classroom. Playing styles are shifting, skills are being further developed, and physical performance standards are rising each and every day. However, I want to point out that it is not just our physical play this is drastically changing. There is an internal culture shift that is occurring each and every day in the gym. Our coaches are teaching us what it looks like to be the kind of team that battles together every point and glorifies God in everything we do.

The women's volleyball team features six freshman and a new coaching staff.

By removing the ceiling to what we thought we were capable of, our coaches are helping us become the kind of athletes, teammates and students of the game that will achieve greatness. Our team is learning how to get comfortable being vulnerable every day in practice and pushing ourselves and one another far past anything we "thought" we could do. We are each other's strongest supporters and toughest coaches at times because we believe that the girl next to us is capable of greatness even when she doubts herself. We are cultivating a mindset that rejects quitting and is only satisfied when we know we have given everything we have within us to achieve our goals each day. Our team is creating something within this program that is only going to continue to prosper and bring glory to our amazing university and the God we love.

There are 19 exceptionally gifted athletes, four knowledgeable coaches and 17,000 passionate students that are all a part of this year's team identity.

If you were to ask me what I thought we are capable of this season, I would have to answer by saying I do not know. I would only give such an open-ended answer because of the fact that every day our ability and potential we see in ourselves and in each other is continually rising. What I am sure of is that there are 19 exceptionally gifted athletes, four extremely experienced and knowledgeable coaches and 17,000 crazy passionate GCU students that are all a part of this year's unique volleyball team's identity. With such exceptional components we are bound to accomplish greatness.

Grand Canyon University Athletics

Players Mentioned

Leigh Stonerook

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