NC State women’s club volleyball looks to continue to build upon recent success this year while also adapting to playing with new faces.

President Brie Saur, a fourth-year, looks on to building team chemistry in preparation for the upcoming five tournaments played during the spring semester.

“Right now we’re working on a lot of team-specific drills,” Saur said. “We have two different teams, a red team and a black team, and I just wanted to do a lot of team stuff the past couple of practices because we’ve had some weird stuff happen to our team with mix-ups.”

The team is looking to rely on its depth this year. Tryouts produced a great turnout which gave the veteran players a talented pool of girls to choose from. However, this is just basic routine for the older players, as turnout for tryouts has been very consistent in recent years.

“It kind of stays the same every year. We have about 50 to 70 girls come to tryouts, and we take about 19 to 21 girls,” Saur said. “This year we have 21 girls but it stays pretty consistent.”

However, Saur says that those numbers can be even larger and that the team would love to have as many girls try out as possible. She had this to say to anyone that has an interest in trying out for the team.

“Definitely come out,” Saur said. “The more girls we have the better because it makes our pool of people to choose from even better. Then we can have an even better team and hopefully win nationals. For anyone that wants to try out, we’d love to have everybody.”

Looking to last season will be sure to help the Pack in its upcoming tournaments as last year proved to be an exciting and successful year. Talented players like third-year Sydney Sozio and second-year Allison Marble look to provide veteran leadership by continuing the winning tradition from last season into this season.

“Last season was one of my favorites,” Sozio said. “It was different chemistry-wise because we had a lot of seniors. Last year we ended on a high because we had a really strong group of people that had been in the program for a while.”

Practice not only helps the team improve just its play on the court but also its chemistry. The practices are run in a way to promote working together and building each other up.

“We have practice twice a week for two hours,” Marble said. “We start out warming up with partners, then we go into team-oriented drills. We focus on team chemistry and working together.”

While unsure about goals to start the season, the team has acclimated to one another and have found a nice rhythm to begin the new year. Looking ahead to nationals, the team’s biggest tournament of the year, expectations are now high for everyone in the program.

“I expect us to do the best we ever have,” Sozio said. “I was a little skeptical coming into this season because we lost so many people last year. A lot of the freshman and new girls have really stepped up. At nationals, we’re looking to win it, which I really think we can do.”