It should come as no surprise that Towson is undefeated and again atop the Colonial Athletic Conference volleyball standings. Head coach Don Metil wrote the book on building team culture.
No.
Really.
He wrote the book, well, at least the handbook that goes to all his players, ahem, on the 14-0 Tigers (4-0 in the CAA). So Metil knows of whence he writes. Check out his three straight CAA championships and three consecutive NCAA trips, or the .846 winning percentage in nine-plus seasons at Towson. The Tigers hope to keep it rolling this season, next hosting North Carolina A&T on Oct. 1 and 2.
There are about 20 pages devoted to the “core values and standards” expected from players in the handbook, and it includes everything from standards of behavior to all aspects of the program like coaching, strength and conditioning, training staff, the athletic administration, academic advisors, tutors, the athletic faculty representative, even alumni.
“Don is really big on maintaining our culture and representing it in a very good way,” said sophomore outside hitter Victoria Barrett, who is fourth in the CAA with a 3.86 points-per-set average during her first season at Towson. “When I first saw [the handbook], I was shocked. But talking to the other players, they said, ‘No, you should read through it.’ I wasn’t going to because I thought it was a lot of repetition, but they said a lot of things in there applied to our practices.”
After three straight CAA championships, call them “best practices” at Towson. Senior defensive specialist Rachel Hess was one of those advocating a thorough reading.
“The handbook has our rules and values, and it keeps our team honest and on track to success,” she said. “We do our best to follow our handbook. If we didn’t have a good culture, we wouldn’t have a good team.”
How good is the culture within this team? Well, Hess was one of many who went to their coach and pressed for a tougher nonconference schedule to steel Metil’s squad even more.
“Myself, and some of the other girls were talking about it and we just thought playing better teams would help prepare us for the tough conference schedule and NCAA [Tournament] games,” Hess said.
The beefed-up schedule could do a lot more than that considering the Tigers’ 3-1 win at No. 7 Pittsburgh in early September, Towson volleyball’s first-ever win over a ranked foe. Accordingly, the Tigers have been in the AVCA poll receiving votes the last few weeks, on the cusp of national rankings.
Hess, a volleyball vet with a sixth sense on the court and apparently off, too, saw this all coming off last year’s 26-5 season. She mentioned adding freshman setter Sarah Jordan and Barrett, a New Mexico State transfer.
“I knew we lost some good players, a few good seniors, but with the incoming girls I had a good feeling,” Hess said. “We added some really strong players to our returning core. We had a lot of experience and we got stronger with Sarah Jordan and Victoria.”
Jordan ranks eighth in the conference with 6.26 assists per set and, in addition to the points she piles up at the net, Barrett’s 0.38 aces per set are fifth in the CAA with a serve clocked at over 50 mph.
They’re not the only statistical standouts for a team that leads the conference in nearly every major category (hitting, opponent hitting, assists, kills, blocks and aces). Junior hitter Nina Cajic and senior blocker Lydia Wiers are first and second in hitting percentage (.442 and .403, respectively). Cajic and Barrett are top 10 in kills (3.11 and 3.09). Wiers is third in blocks (1.11) and Aayinde Smith is seventh (0.98). Hess is seventh in digs (3.43).
“We’ve got a lot of power at the sticks,” Metil said of a dominating front. “Nina Cajic, Irbe Lazda are our starting opposite [hitters]. Fay Bakodimou and Victoria Barrett anchor the outside pin. We’ve got three good options in the middle. Lydia has started and played her entire career here. Aayinde Smith and Erin Brothers are athletically talented in the middle and allow us to do a lot of things.
“Rachel Hess played libero last year and we moved her to left back. We’re trying to run a back-row attack and that has been an added component. We’re in a 6-2 [formation] but we can flip into a 5-1. There are a lot of options with a talented team, and we’re getting a lot from off our bench, too.”
The 5-foot-9 Barrett, though, who was Western Athletic Conference Freshman of the Year last season, is an eye-popping talent all over the court.
“She probably got passed by a few programs because she’s a little undersized, but her talent level supersedes her height,” Metil said. “She’s a true six-rotational athlete. When I talked to her and she said her favorite thing on the court was serve-receive-pass, I was all in.”
The Tigers had to replace graduated first-team All-CAA Emily Jarome, who excelled in that role last year. Knowing Barrett was in the transfer portal and so far from her Stafford, Va., home, Metil and his staff thought they might be able to lure her back east. They were, a lot because of the culture and the way they treat student-athletes.
“This was one of the schools that was willing to help me figure out how I could transfer faster [in mid-semester], fill out the wavier and all that,” Barrett said. “They were one of the first schools to reach out to me in the portal.”
Barrett’s personal manifest destiny out West began because the Aggies were one of a small number of schools that didn’t care that she was a 5-foot-9 outside hitter. Ultimately, though it was distance, not height that made her want to come back.
“It was too far from home,” she said. “I needed to be closer to family.”
The Barretts have always been a tight-knit bunch.
“My family is the biggest support system I’ve had,” she said. “My parents were in the military, and my whole family has always been very athletic, and my parents [mother Liza and father Robert] always supported me in whatever I wanted to do.”
And what Victoria Barrett wanted to do early on was dance. She was with a local Stafford dance studio for nine years, tripping the light fantastic in tap, ballet, jazz, hip-hop, whatever she could get her feet on. She liked being a part of the competitive genre, and when her older sister, Tiffany, started playing volleyball, Victoria was watching and wanted to try that, too. Three years later, in eighth grade, Barrett put away her dancing shoes in favor of volleyball.
Maybe it was the footwork, but for whatever reason, Barrett was a natural in the sport where her competitive instincts came alive. Tiffany, seven years older, and the all-time kills leader at Virginia Wesleyan College, certainly helped.
Now Liza and Robert are courtside for all of Towson’s home games, so chalk that aspect up as another quality of life improvement for Victoria, who is still growing and improving in the game. She can “touch” 10-foot, 4-or-5 inches jumping, and has skills that translate at the net and on the back line, commodities even this talented team needs.
“She has a wide range of shots,” Metil said. “Incredibly bright on the court and a fast learner. She has a lot of tools in her toolbox that make her dangerous. But hearing some other girls on the court that play with her, her biggest attribute for us is her calming influence. Her demeanor and her presence, She doesn’t get shaken. She’s even-keeled.”
You can have that calming aura when you’re comfortable and happy in a program with new teammates. It’s like dancing when nobody’s watching.
Metil understands that. He wrote the book.
Photo Credits: Courtesy of Towson Athletics