Phil Hudson isn’t fretting needlessly about the prospect of bringing six raw rookies into the fold as members of the University of Winnipeg women’s volleyball team.
His motto might as well be, ‘Why worry when you have talent and a willingness to work?’
The Wesmen coach, who is entering his fifth decade of teaching the game at various levels, will have six first-year players to replace the six veterans lost to graduation in the off-season.
Mike Thiessen / Winnipeg Free Press
Ella Werbiski is one of six first-year players on the University of Winnipeg Wesmen women’s volleyball team.
Departing are vets Taylor Kleysen, Ashleigh Laube, Emma Parker, Kely Warmington, Haille Bujan and Mikaela Cameron.
Enter left side Brooke Duncalfe, middle Paige Forrer, outside Megan Kendziora, middle Emily Lavalee, setter Naomi Unger and left side Ella Werbiski.
With the exception of Kendziora, who’s 5-10, the members of this 2023 recruiting class are all at least 6-feet tall.
Hudson, who guided the Wesmen to a fourth-place finish in Canada West last season, prefers to call the process ‘retooling,’ rather than ‘rebuilding,’ but that doesn’t mean there won’t be some hard times ahead.
“They’re very young,” said Hudson prior to the third workout of the season at Dakota Community Centre Wednesday. “We lost a lot of experience last year, but we’ve got a good recruiting class of six new kids coming in and we have some veteran experience with two veteran setters coming back, but it’s going to take a while to get up to the pace of the U Sports level.”
One of the players showing a lot of promise is Unger, an 18-year-old Kelvin product.
“I think being with such a large rookie class there’s that kind of benefit where we’re all able to (make an impression),” said Unger. “We’re like a pretty large percentage of the team and so I think it’s an opportunity for all of us to try and find our way.”
At 6-1, she will be one of the tallest at her position in the conference.
“My coach Jen Krahn from the Junior Bisons — she’s been my coach since I was 14 — she always kept me as a setter and I think she saw the advantage of having a tall setter,” said Unger, 18. “And it’s worked out.”
Meanwhile, the 6-1 Werbiski starred at Vincent Massey-Brandon before deciding to join her Brandon club volleyball teammate Lavalee in Wesmen colours.
“I think it comes down to skill as well,” said Werbiski, explaining height is only part of an elite player’s performance. “Because if you have someone who can jump through anything, like Emma Parker, she was an undersized player but she showed the way.”
Werbiski is trying to keep an uncluttered mindset about her rookie year while learning from veterans such as libero Taylor Cangemi, setter Portia Switzer and left side Selva Planincic.
“I’m not really thinking about what’s ahead,” said Werbiski, 18. “I’m just focusing on practice. It’s like, ‘What can I do?’ I’m trying to get the rust off and just ease back into it and work myself into being more competitive.”
The Wesmen women will head to a pre-season tournament in North Dakota next week to ramp up the evaluation process.
Lavalee, who went to high school at Major Pratt in Russell, is enjoying the transition to her new academic and volleyball life. Classes start next week.
“It’s nice to just come in and know someone (Werbiski) and already have a friend,” said Lavalee, 17. “That makes things less scary.”
Hudson has a good feeling about the team’s new crop of players.
“There’s lots of things come into play about when you’re trying to recruit kids,” he said. “They’ve got to be good people to start with and really good students, to be able to handle the travel and course load. They’ve got to very good volleyball skills and they need the physicality, so lots of our kids have all of those intact so I’m really looking forward to seeing how they progress in the first couple of months.”
