Trips Are Closer to Home for Wise

First-year Concordia women’s volleyball Coach Jody Wise listened earlier this season to several of her players complaining about a long drive on an impending trip to Cal Lutheran.

How long was it going to take, Wise wondered. Two hours, she was told.

“The players and I definitely have a different perspective about what a long trip is,” Wise said.

One of the main reasons Wise took the job at Concordia was to escape road-trip hell. At Fort Hays State, an NCAA Division II school in central Kansas, where Wise coached previously, the nearest conference opponent was three hours away.

It took more than 10 hours to get to places such as Durango and Grand Junction, Colo., and Las Vegas, N.M. Moreover, anyone familiar with geography knows those trips go through the Rocky Mountains. More than once, Wise said, she and her team were trapped by blizzards or slides.

At Concordia, the most fearsome conference trip is to Fresno Pacific. “Personally, I’m not thinking that Fresno is going to be that bad,” Wise said. “Five hours, that was like our second-closest trip at Fort Hays.”

But Wise has other challenges at Concordia. She took the job last spring after compiling a 559-406 record in 18 seasons at Fort Hays and got a slow start in recruiting because she wasn’t able to move to Orange County until July.

Only four players are back from the team that advanced to the NAIA Far West Regional playoffs. Two returning seniors have been leading the team: middle blocker Minna Huovila and outside hitter Geodi Sunabe.

The Eagles play in the Golden State Athletic Conference, one of the toughest NAIA conferences in the nation. Wise said the top GSAC teams would be competitive with the Division II teams her Fort Hays teams faced.

The Eagles (5-7, 0-2 in conference) are in the midst of a tough week. Tuesday, they lost to undefeated Biola, 12-15, 15-8, 15-6, 15-8. Saturday, they host Cal Baptist, another tough conference opponent.

Thursday, they lost to perennial power Cal State Bakersfield, the nation’s fourth-ranked Division II team, 15-8, 16-14, 17-15. “No one will fess up to adding them to my schedule,” Wise said.

She hopes her team will improve by playing such strong teams. Wise noted that Biola had lost only one game in its first 12 matches before the Eagles won the first game.

“We didn’t win the match,” Wise said, “but we played good volleyball and cut down on a lot of our errors.”