By Logan Nipper, Macy Morgan, Abe Avilla and Parker Tuerff
In the summer of 2019, a statement was released by Vice Chancellor and Director of Athletics Mark Wharton that the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga will add women's beach volleyball as its 16th NCAA Division I intercollegiate sport.
Volleyball is a sport at UTC that contains a great deal of history that many are unaware of. The Moc’s won crowned the Southern Conference championship in 1987, 1996, 1997, and 1998. They were runner up in both 2015 and 2016, but have failed to hoist the trophy in since ‘98’.
Fast forward to 2019, UTC have had a share of struggles in the early season. The team is currently 5-11 overall and 0-3 in Southern Conference play after their most recent 3-0 defeat to Western Carolina. The loss to WCU is the second 3-0 defeat in a row--- the first coming at the hands of ETSU. But, despite the team’s early struggles on the court, player Maddie Halsey is hoping to have a standout year for the squad.
Halsey is a Junior from Rochester hills, Michigan and is entering her third season with an impressive resume. Her sophomore year she made Academic All-Southern Conference, Southern Conference Academic Honor Roll, appeared in 22 matches and 61 sets and made one start, posted 240 assists at a 3.93 per set average while having 12 matches with 10+ assists. She totaled 98 digs---at least one in every match played. Before college, Halsey was rated Highest Honorable Mention Freshman 59 best in country by PrepVolleyball.com, a 2x All-County MVP (2016-17), 2x team captain (2016-17) and Captain eight-straight years of club program
“I think that volleyball helps with academics,” Halsey says. “I’m used to a fast mental stimulant. When I sit down for school I do things quickly. This year, we’re just trying to upset some teams honestly. We’re just trying to play our game consistently at a high level no matter who is on the other side of the net.”
She added that her individual goals consisted of her leading and guiding this team to meet team goals.
Another member of the Mocs volleyball team who hopes to have a presence on the court is Junior Bailey Bennett from College Station, Texas. Bailey is entering her junior campaign with an impressive resume of her own. She earned Southern Conference Academic Honor Roll her freshmen and sophomore year. Her sophomore season she appeared in 33 sets over 10 matches, posted 75 digs at a 2.27 per set average, three matches with 10+ digs,
recorded career-high 13 digs against The Citadel, posted 11 digs against Wofford and 10 at Western Carolina.
“My individual goals would be to fill the role I have on the team the best I can---to be the best version of me that I can,” Bennett says. “Getting in the gym every day and getting better as well as leading in whatever role I’m given whether that’s being energetic or very encouraging.”
With the announcement of Beach volleyball at UTC also came with some detail regarding how the sport would be implemented.
"We are excited about the addition of Beach Volleyball to our Intercollegiate athletics lineup,” Wharton says. “It is one of the rising competitive programs in the NCAA and bringing it to Chattanooga is exciting for our university and community.”
UTC will have a limited schedule in the spring of 2020 before competing in a full season in spring of 2021. Chattanooga will announce and confirm conference alignment some time soon. The roaster of beach volleyball players this spring will consist of the indoor volleyball student-athletes who retain eligibility in Spring 2020.
“I don’t have much experience at beach,” Halsey says. “I played in maybe a couple tournaments growing up—we had one league when I was in 8th grade. It was just a fun thing for me that I never really took seriously so when I heard that it would be a uniform thing I was like, really? But I’m excited for it.”
Halsey is interested to see how this type of cross training would flow into the following fall season. Bennett on the other hand took is taking a different approach.
“I’m so excited,” she says. “I just love beach. I don’t know how we’re going to train because moving in the sand it a lot different, but I think it’ll be really good for our jumping and our movement on the indoor court. We play beach for fun a lot and it’s just so much fun.”
Although the beach volleyball roster will consist of indoor players, it is not a requirement for them to participate. Currently, the school is trying to recruit a player that is solely for beach play. Right now the plan is to have six different teams two-player teams. One area of question for the players is to see how they are to train for their fall season while beach volleyball is in season.
Current indoor assistant volleyball coach Darin Van Horn has been asked to oversee the Mocs' beach volleyball program. Van Horn is entering his fifth season at UTC. He helped lead the indoor team to its first Southern Conference regular season title in two decades with a 26-6 record during his first season.
“It’s different dimesons than an indoor court,” Van Horn says. “Because you have only two players there is a lot more ground to cover. It’s a different pace and more shot based. Just a lot of smart shots need to be taken.”
Halsey and Bennett agreed that in terms of seriousness compared to indoor, beach is a care free zone, but they are natural competitors and Van Horn is taking it seriously, which has already impacted them. They added that beach will help them in training as well for the following indoor season due to the lack of mobility and increase in area that needs to be covered.
Currently, the schedule for beach volleyball has not been made. The indoor team heads to Macon, Georgia to take on Mercer on October 9th at 7:00PM.
Title IX is a federal law that states “No person in the United States shall, based on sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any educational program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance.”
Title IX does not require equal dollars to be spent on men’s and women’s sports, but it requires that scholarships must be proportional. At the beginning of 2019, the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga did not fully comply with Title IX. As of fall 2018, the male to female ratio was 4,486 to 5,753. According to the NCAA website, some requirements to stay in compliance with Title IX include, “providing participation opportunities for women and men that are substantially proportionate to their respective rates of enrollment of full-time undergraduate students and female and male student-athletes must receive athletics scholarship dollars proportional to their participation.” The university has a disparity between the percentage of women taking part in athletics compared to the overall student population, which is about 55 percent female.
Even though the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga did not fully comply with Title IX, they are taking steps towards getting in full compliance. The latest improvement has been adding another female sports team. There was a consideration for several teams like a rowing, bowling or beach volleyball team. Beach volleyball ended up beating the other options out.
UTC has been struggling to get completely in Title IX for several years now. In 2015 the men’s track and field teams were cut because the University decided at the time, they could not afford to bring on a woman’s team and sustain it. Fast forward to 2019, The University has made some other decisions and now they can look forward to the beach volleyball team taking the sand court in the Spring of 2020.