Oct. 6, 2005

Columbia – After garnering second team All-SEC honors as a sophomore last year and spending the summer as part of the U.S. Women’s national team, junior outside hitter Shonda Cole has been a dominant force this season.

“Being with some of the best girls in the world, they were able to teach leadership skills,” said Cole. “I was able to sit back and see what they would do in certain situations and I kind of brought it here. I think I grew up as a player; I actually learned the game of volleyball instead of just getting out there playing.”

The improvement has shown on the court too. Already an accomplished player, Cole has been destroying the opposition this season, getting double digit kills in every match so far this season and helping lead South Carolina to a 9-5 record (2-2 SEC).

And she’s not the only one who’s stepped their game up this season for the surprising Gamecocks.

“Everyone’s competitive spirit and work ethic in the gym, and effort in the gym, has just gotten a lot better,” Cole said when comparing this year’s squad to those from her previous two seasons in Columbia. “We have very good team unity on the court this year. As far as volleyball, technique and skills, our defense and passing has improved. We’re passing way better than we did last year. We’re giving ourselves more opportunities to score. We’re not making as many mistakes. I know for myself personally, I have been smarter about my attack selection.”

Cole attributes part of that improvement to new head coach Nancy Somera and the rest of the coaching staff.

“They mesh well together,” said Cole. “The things that they’ve brought to our team as far as volleyball, I don’t know how to describe it. It’s just a whole different perspective on things.”

Working out some of the “kinks” in the locker room also helped according to Cole, and now the gamecocks are hoping to prove those who voted them to finish 4th in the SEC East this season as wrong.

“We’ve lost some games and we’ve won some, and we’ve learned some things thus far,” said Cole. “We’re just taking the season game by game and progressing as a team to the end. I think by the end of the season, we’ll be where we want to be.”

And where is that?

“For the rest of the season, one of our goals is to finish top 3 in the SEC, and I definitely think we can accomplish that by getting in the gym everyday and practicing hard.”

Over the summer, Cole was among those with the prestigious honor of being one of only three collegians chosen to participate on the women’s national team traveling to play tournaments in the Dominican Republic, China, Korea, and Thailand. The practices were twice a day, and the games were played at a faster pace than she was used to, but Cole enjoyed her time with the squad.

“I’ve never been to China before, you know, China! Being on the plane for 23 hours was worth it,” said the King’s Mountain, N.C. native. “We tried to find time to see the sights, but since our practices were so tight, we rarely had time. But when you drove around, it was like sight-seeing.”

One thing Cole missed out on during her time with the national team this summer was being with her teammates.

“We started a team night every Tuesday night,” said Cole. “We’ve been trying to keep that up during the school year. We do thing together like go to the movies or someone will cook at their house.”

“We’re going to turn some heads, because people don’t really know about South Carolina volleyball.”

With a strong new coaching staff and players like Cole around, along with a talented freshman class that is already making solid contributions, it’s only a matter of time before people find out.