Middle Tennessee Volleyball used to be a powerhouse of the Sun-Belt conference. With four conference championships in five years from 2006-2010 to go with six consecutive NCAA Tournament berths from 2006-2011, the Blue Raiders experienced a run never seen before in the program’s history under former head coach, Matt Peck. Now, after coming off the program’s first 20-win season since 2011, MTSU is looking to punch that NCAA Tournament ticket for the first time in 14 years.

Last year, under now eighth-year head coach Chuck Crawford, the Blue Raiders enjoyed their best season since joining Conference-USA with their 11 conference wins being the most in any season since 2013. Offensively, they posted their highest hitting percentage (.303) in program history, and MTSU returns two All-Conference outside hitters from a season ago in Adri Rhoda and Laure Jansen. Despite graduating a few key pieces from last year’s team at other positions, the Blue Raiders are showing signs of getting back to the dominant days enjoyed in the late-2000s.

“I was in the stands when they won the Sun Belt, so I’ve seen it at the highest highs, then it kind of went downhill a little bit when I first got here,” said Assistant Coach Taylor Holmes. “Now it reminds me of back in the day when we were winning the Sun Belt, so I’m excited.”

Holmes, an MT graduate herself, has been involved in the volleyball program since 2014 and officially on paid staff since 2018, but has been around it for even longer than that. 

“I grew up going to volleyball camps when I was little, and I’ve been a huge MTSU Volleyball fan for my whole life.”

Holmes is from Columbia – just shy of an hour-long drive from campus – and has been on staff for Crawford’s entire tenure of patrolling the sidelines of Alumni Memorial Gym. She has not only seen, but contributed, to the program slowly but surely turning around and morphing into a team that can compete at the highest level again. 

Two years ago, the Blue Raiders had their first winning season since 2013 at 15-14, but only went 4-10 in conference play. Last year, MT improved upon that mark, going 20-11 overall, but more importantly posting an 11-5 record in conference play. This was good enough to get an invite to the NIVC – volleyball’s version of the NIT in college basketball – after faltering in the conference tournament against FIU, but this season their sights are set on The Big Dance. 

Despite graduating the Conference-USA Setter of the Year in Taylor Eisert – who surpassed 3,000 career assists – and First Team All-Conference performer Kayla Henlee along with Second Team All-Conference Kaylee Oscarson, the returning talent combined with some fresh faces have expectations sky-high in the ‘Boro.

“Our returners have done a great job embracing all the new additions, because we have a lot of talented freshmen as well,” said Holmes. “We are very excited to see what they can do this year.”

Some of those new faces are talented freshmen while two others are graduate transfer students. Brooke Springer and Kiera Booth are both middle blockers from Evansville and Villanova, respectively, and they will hopefully slide into the team almost seamlessly to help replace some of the production lost from last year’s team.

“We graduated both of our middle blockers, so that middle spot is open,” Holmes explained. “We have a very talented freshman coming in who is a really great blocker, and then both transfers in. We graduated our setter, but Caroline is a junior, and then we’ve got a couple freshman, Andi and Reagan, who were here in the spring to train, so that should be a fun competition too.”

Springer recorded 62 kills with a .309 hitting percentage last season with the Purple Aces as well as leading the team with .99 blocks averaged per set which was also good enough for sixth in the Missouri Valley Conference. 

Grad transfer Brooke Springer (2) tallied 117.0 total points last season with Evansville.

Like Springer, Booth was an integral part of her old team a year ago. She was named to the All-BIG EAST team after starting all 31 games for Villanova and playing in every set. Not only that, but she led her team in scoring six times while emerging as the block leader in 10 matches. She also recorded 17 double-digit kill matches, including seven in a row to close out the season.

Grad transfer Kiera Booth (23) played every set for Villanova last season.

Of course, middle blocker isn’t the only position that needed some reinforcements over the offseason.

“We’ve got some great liberos coming in,” Holmes continued, “and we also have some people in some different roles than they have ever been in in the past. Trae was primarily an outside hitter for us the last couple years, but we have trained her a lot on the right side this summer. Aowyn is a freshman coming in that has a hammer for an arm, so it'll be fun to see what she does.”

This isn’t even mentioning returning First Team All-Conference performer Adri Rhoda and Second-Teamer Laure Jansen. 

As a sophomore last season, Rhoda improved upon an impressive freshmen campaign. She led the team in points per set (4.10), kills (347), and kills per set (3.47) while she was also second in points (403.0), aces (37), and aces per set (0.4). Just for good measure, she finished fourth on the team in total blocks (41) and blocks per set (0.41) as well. Rhoda also recorded double-digit kills in 19 matches last season, and had 20 or more kills in three of them.

Jansen, a transfer from Arkansas-Little Rock, started and played in all 30 matches in her first year as a Blue Raider. She finished second on the team in digs (270) and digs per set (2.50) while finishing third on the team in kills (327), kills per set (2.56, service aces (31), points (324.5), and points per set (3.00). Jansen also finished fourth on the team in assists with 16.

Laure Jansen (10) was Second Team All-Conference USA a season ago.

After putting their stats into perspective, one would begin to understand the hype around the MTSU Volleyball program for 2024, and the scary part is that there is still plenty of room for improvement from a year ago.

“Last year we started out a little rough in the preseason, but once we won that first game, we started rolling,” said Holmes. “The girls went into every game expecting to win, but we just kind of fell short in that conference tournament. Last year we struggled with finishing games. We would do great in the beginning and middle, but sometimes we would get to set or match points and just be unable to put it away. That’s really where our focus has been all spring, just finishing a game strong.”

This hasn’t just been a point of emphasis vocally; that is something that the team has actively practiced on the court.

“We do a lot of situational scoring, so we’ll play the score back when we had a match point, and just repeat that,” Holmes emphasized. “Just drilling it into them that you have to finish. Two years ago we had struggles with slow starts, and after we worked on that all spring, it wasn’t a problem last year at all.”

One of the biggest catalysts for the extra practice? Last year’s match with longtime rival, Western Kentucky.

“We had a couple set points on Western, especially in that second game, and we just didn’t finish,” she explained. “So that’s one of the score examples that we do use in practice. We had every opportunity, we were talented, we passed well, we served them really tough. We executed our game plan at a high level, but at the end we just didn't finish it. We’re right there, and obviously the whole entire conference is stacked and talented, but there’s always that rivalry with Western. It’s really fun and the girls enjoy it.”

“We’re right there, and we’re ready.”

Western has been the gold standard for C-USA Volleyball for the last handful of years, but the Blue Raiders seem to be in a position to genuinely compete with the Hilltoppers for the first time since their Sun-Belt days. However, WKU is far from the only team you have to worry about in the conference.

“C-USA has historically been very strong, so we’re normally able to get anywhere from one to three teams into the NCAA Tournament any given year,” Holmes said.

This is why they try to schedule so strongly out of conference, according to Holmes. For example, last year the Blue Raiders went on the road to Auburn and beat the 25th ranked Tigers, 3-1, to earn their first ranked win since 2010, and it served as a sign of what was to come in conference play.

This season, the goals that MT has are pretty standard, but they also serve as a reminder of the level that the program has reached once again.

“Our girls have a lot of individual goals they want to accomplish, Adri has really wanted to be Conference POTY, stuff like that,” said Holmes. “We normally take it game by game, sometimes if you look at the whole schedule all at once you can get kind of unfocused on what’s in front of you. But, at the end of the day, a conference championship and NCAA Tournament berth are our goals.”

One of the biggest hurdles in this new-age of conferences is the extensive travel. This has been exaggerated in Conference USA with the additions of New Mexico State and UTEP, along with a few others. The good news is that since this year’s Conference Tournament is being held in El Paso, the Blue Raiders will already have had experience playing at UTEP, unlike last year when the tournament was held at Liberty.

“Last year we played Liberty at home, so when we went up there for the first time for the tournament, it was a big adjustment seeing their gym for the first time,” Holmes said. “We play in a volleyball gym, which is a bit more intimate and smaller, so sometimes playing in those basketball arenas, you have to get used to it.” 

Little things like the air conditioning wind having an effect on serves, the sheer size, and the lighting difference all can contribute to momentarily throwing someone off their game for even a split second, and it takes an adjustment period most times. However, the Blue Raiders are confident that such adjustments will not hinder them from accomplishing their goals. 

2011 was the last time MTSU Volleyball qualified for the NCAA Tournament, but 2024 seems like it will be the program’s best chance to make it back since then. What would it mean to the program to return to the Big Dance?

“It would be extremely exciting,” Holmes concluded. “The alumni that have come before all these girls, they have put in so much hard work, and we are just trying to follow in their footsteps and do it for them and for the kids on the team right now who are putting in all the hard work.”

The Blue Raiders hold their annual Blue/White scrimmage this Friday, August 16, before going to Belmont to face off in an exhibition against the Bruins on August 23 to conclude the preseason.