Monday, August 26, 2013

Interview with Libero OJ Olson and DS Janet Hill

OK, as if I haven't said this enough:  My favorite part of volleyball is back row defense.  In fact, my favorite two "plays" in volleyball are:

  1. Stud OH on opposing team tries to thunder one down on us and one of our back row players is in the perfect position.  The ball gets crushed but our defender is standing in the exact path of the ball, sets her feet and platform and just perfectly digs the ball a few inches off the ground and the pass goes straight to the setter camped out in middle front.  When that happens it's like the defender just brushed a piece of lint off her jersey and said "Huh.. what was that? That all you got? Weak."           Love it.
  2. Both teams are going back and forth during a long rally - long enough where every time the ball crosses the net the crowd's energy builds one level more.  Then, a ball gets loose way outside the boundary of the court and one of our back row defenders dives to floor and keeps the ball up by a fraction of an inch and we go on to win the point.  That happened one time during a match last year with Libero Maddie Hanlan and I got so excited I accidentally kicked the media table and we thought it was going to fall apart and pieces roll out on the court during play.  It's the one play that as a PA announcer sometimes causes me to lose focus because it is just so darn awesome.
So that brings us to today's interview with back row players Janet Hill and OJ Olson.

The interview is full of discussion regarding back row positioning on defense and reading blocks and other great volleyball theory stuff that I could just sit and talk about all day.

Plus, we get into who is the shortest player on the team, why OJ roots for the Minnesota Vikings, the many schools of the Cy-Fair ISD where Janet is from and how each player has experience as a hitter, despite their uhhh.. diminutive stature.  Also, we get to hear about the origin of the nickname "OJ" and how Hill once starred in the "Janet Show".

Check it out in the link below.  Also, this will be my first chance to let the readers know that I will be in Monroe, LA (Happy, Happy, Happy!!) for our Labor Day match against ULM.  As always when I travel, we will have a live chat room set up right here on the blog so that parents, friends and general volleyball enthusiasts can follow the action along with me.  Regular tweets will also go out during the match so make sure you've followed us on Twitter if you haven't already.  We are @SFAVolleyBlog.  Make sure and follow @SFAVolleyball as well since that is the OFFICIAL Twitter account of 'Jacks Volleyball.

Still planning on having a post focused on the conference as a whole and another interview (Ivy and Allen?) go up later in the week.

Click Here for Interview with OJ Olson & Janet Hill