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My family is a typical sports obsessed family. My mom grew up golfing and playing tennis, and she even won state in doubles. My dad was a great football player, and my older brother caught at the collegiate level. I played many sports when I was younger, but as I got older, I found my passion playing volleyball. You could say that athletics run in our blood. When I was little, people always told me that I just had a natural ability for volleyball. Being 6 years old didn't really help me understand what that really meant. I remember going to my dad, asking why people were telling me this after my games; I mean I was playing in the Park and Rec league. My dad said, "well Sam, when it comes to sports, you have it, or you don't. God blessed you with the ability to play volleyball; you're lucky. Just remember that you always need to work hard no matter what." My dad was right, once I started playing club volleyball, I learned that you can be the most naturally talented player in the gym, but if you don't work hard and drive yourself to push past what you know you can do, natural ability will only get you so far.

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I have never been the tall one; I was always one of the shortest in my class or on my team. When I was in 4th grade, I watched my backyard neighbor playing volleyball in her yard. She coached one of the local high school volleyball teams, and I was amazed watching her play. She could do it all, and I specifically noticed the way she could set the ball. Her hands just flowed with the ball, and it was then that I decided to become a setter rather than being a defensive specialist. My coach at the time told me that I was too short to be a setter and that I should stick to playing the back row. The next day after my coach told me no, I saw my neighbor playing in the yard again. I went over to her and said, "Jess, I want to be a setter. I need you to teach me how to set." She smiled at me, told me that being a setter takes a lot of work, but that she thought that I could be really good. As we practiced all day, I started to get extremely frustrated because I could not get my hands to push symmetrically. Jess had me sit on the grass with my hands in the air. She said, "pretend that you are holding a liter of soda above your forehead. I turned my thumbs toward my face and shifted my wrists back. She set the ball in my hands and said, "this is how you always start your contact with the ball. Your hands should take the shape of the ball, just like you're holding your soda." She took the ball and three big steps away from me. She then told me to put my hands out like Superman flying towards her to give her high-fives with both hands. I was starting to think she was just messing with me, but the next thing I know she yells, "great! Now put those two things together with the ball!" She threw the ball at me, and all I thought was 'soda to Superman.' I was shocked to see that the ball came out perfectly with no spin or rotation whatsoever. Jess's little trick worked, and I learned bimanual coordination when it comes to setting.

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I think that everyone has been playing in that big rivalry game on the other team's court. Being on their court when they have the majority crowd always adds a lot of pressure, especially when you have to step back and serve right in front of their student section. My sophomore year of high school we went to our biggest conference rivals for the season opener. We were tied 22-22 in the first set. The gym was going crazy, and my team had just had a huge stuff block at the net. My team's energy was high, and the pressure was on to take the first set. The winner of this set would have the momentum going into the second set, and this team was not a team you wanted to let get ahead. I had known a lot of the people in their student section because I went to the Catholic elementary school with them; this only added to the pressure of having to step back and serve. After we had celebrated the huge block, I walked back behind the service line. I kept going over and over the steps of serving in my mind; I told myself 'make sure your toss is just the right height, right over my left toe. Don't step over the line, and don't miss this serve. My heart was racing, and I could feel the pressure building as the referee blew the whistle. I repeated the steps again, just to make sure. I tossed the ball, took my step, and swung my arm. As I followed through, I watched the float on the ball, thinking this was going to be a low floating ace. The ball started to drop and hit the top of the tape. After it hit the tape it fell and landed on our side of the net. Not the best time to choke under the pressure. Needless to say, I fought back to redeem myself and the win.

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Junior year of high school, my coach came to me the first day of practice. She said, "Sam, I need you to step in the serve receive drill for a while." I was kind of in shock; was she joking?  I'm a setter? I don't serve receive. She went on to tell me that she wanted to be stay in all six rotations, and that means that I would need to hit on the right side. That also meant that I needed to learn how to serve receive. I jumped into the drill, and I definitely struggled at first. I stepped off the court and decided to figure out how I could understand to best serve receive. I ultimately decided to break it down into steps that I could talk myself through before each serve. The first step, the server tosses the ball up; this signaled to me that the ball is coming. I would watch the server's shoulder to see where she is aiming her serve. The second step was to decide where the ball was going and where I needed to move-- how I could anticipate where the ball was going. Was it short or deep? Was it to my left or to my right? How do I move my feet and get set for the pass? I needed to decide how to respond to the serve. Finally, I would need to move my decision to the rest of my body so I could respond correctly to the ball. If I decided the ball was going short, I needed to shuffle up and get my platform there. If I had shuffled too far forward, I would need to adjust and take the serve with my hands. I would need to make sure that my feet and hips were in position to get the ball up so my setter could make the play. Every time I would step back to serve receive, I would walk myself through the three steps of information processing. Every practice I seemed to get better at reading the ball, and I could make quicker responses to the serve.

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Playing volleyball and coaching volleyball are two separate animals. After my senior year of high school, my coach asked me to coach the incoming freshman team for the summer. I couldn't wait to get back to the court, so I enthusiastically agreed. The first practice, I had a great practice plan. I was so excited to pass on what I had learned over my years of playing. I had the girls start in a passing drill, and I noticed that a lot of them had some troubles with form. I stopped the drill and had everyone's attention. I started by talking through the form of passing. I noticed that I was fumbling with words and I tried to make analogies like my coaches had done in the past. The girls all had strange looks on their faces, and one girl raised her hand. I stopped and acknowledged her question. She quietly said, "um... coach, I don't really know what you're talking about." I laughed and agreed. I responded with, "maybe it would just be easier if I show you what I mean." It was so easy for me to just jump into the drill and perform the skill for the girls to watch, but I tried to put it into words, I was at a loss. I had no idea how to actually explain what I was doing, but I could show them what I meant. My procedural memory allowed me to teach the girls proper form, but my semantic memory was not as strong. Since I was passing for so long without having to think about each step, I strengthened my memory of the full movement rather than my memory of each step.