By: by KSU Sports Information
KENNESAW, Ga. - Alyssa Lang is closing in on the biggest personal milestone in her volleyball career. While on the surface it appears to be a milestone that is four years in the making, in truth, it is a milestone that has been on the horizon for nearly 15 years.
"I never really knew I wanted to play volleyball, but my mom threw me into it when I was young," Alyssa Lang said when talking about volleyball and her youth. "When I was six, my mom was refereeing and playing at the Richmond Volleyball Club. So she would be at this facility, and I would not only watch volleyball but I'd run around with a volleyball in my hands all the time."
From 6 p.m. until at least 11:30 at night for six nights a week, Lang would be at the RVC. Seeing her mom's involvement with the sport, plus seeing the other youths and adults play the sport, Lang soon found herself getting equally as involved. "When I was 12, I got on my first adult league team," Lang said. "It was a good, co-ed team. I didn't hit front row much because we were playing with a men's net and I was 12, but passing was the one thing I could do right off the bat in a higher league."
Passing the volleyball became one of the things that drove the Richmond, Va., native on the court. "Growing up playing volleyball, I was taught that a pass starts everything. That's where I really grew to love playing defense and passing. Teams in volleyball that have a great defense ultimately win because they keep the ball up and going."
Still, as Lang matured, so did her abilities on the court. By her own recollection, Lang has played every spot on the court at some point since she began playing volleyball with the exception of middle blocker. Still, her coaches slowly steered Lang towards being an outside hitter. "I used to be a setter because a coach said I had great hands. I wasn't happy being a setter, so he decided to make me an outside hitter."
As she got older, she started playing on teams that were above her age level, mostly because she had essentially lived in the gym her whole life. At the age of 14, Lang was playing on a team comprised mostly of 17 year old girls that were already juniors or seniors in high school.
At the high school level, Lang started to flourish on the court. Her sophomore year at Deep Run High School in Richmond, the team made it all the way to the state finals. The run would go all the way to the championship match against Douglas S. Freeman. "I remember how badly they had beaten us three time before because they were in the same district that we were in," Lang recounted. "When we got to the state finals, we lost 15-12 in the fifth set."
The bitter taste of defeat was only slightly sweetened by the fact that Lang recorded a state-record 42 digs in the loss. "It was such an intense match and we all played our hearts out," Lang said. "That's the only match I've ever lost in my whole career and cried about it afterward because we all wanted it so badly."
Lang and her DRHS teammates had an added motivation going into the offseason and returning for the next year. "We kind of got lucky because all of the girls on the club team at RVC lived in the same school district. I knew how much I wanted for us to hold that trophy at the end of the season."
The run for the state championship started again for Lang her junior year. This time, she wouldn't be denied. A 3-0 sweep of Hanover gave Lang the championship she had coveted since seeing it slip away the year before. Tears of sorrow would be replaced by tears of joy.
For her senior year sendoff, Lang and the Lady Wildcats did something that had never been done before. For the first time in the history of high school volleyball in the state of Virginia, Deep Run won the state championship for the second year in a row. "When we won my senior year, I expected for us to do so," Lang stated. "I knew we were going to win and I did everything in my power to make sure we would win. That's the confidence I had in my team."
Lang knew she was going to be playing volleyball in college when she was younger, but didn't know where. Sight unseen, Lang decided to sign to play at Maryland-Baltimore County. While statistically Lang had two of her best seasons on the court at UMBC, her passion for the game was slowly deteriorating.
"I needed the UMBC experience to realize how lucky I am to be at Kennesaw," Lang said. "UMBC just wasn't the right fit for me. I committed before I visited. I hardly got to know the team. I wish I had done all of that."
After her sophomore season, Lang made the decision to take her 553 kills and 514 digs to another school. What school that would be provided a life-changing answer.
"I looked into Division I schools that had a good volleyball team," Lang said as she started to rattle off the list of requirements. "It had to be a school that had my major. It had to be a school in the southeast. Truthfully, I always felt like I would end up in the state of Georgia growing up. The school also needed to have a scholarship available for me. There were several schools that fell into those categories, but Kennesaw State just always stood out above them."
"Alyssa was a product of that recruiting dream we all have as coaches," said KSU head coach Karen Weatherington. "She sent us an email and was just so specific of who she was and what she was looking for. She was amazingly thorough. I had been aware of her club at RVC because I had recruited athletes from that club over the years. I got that email from Alyssa and was intrigued and interested in getting her on campus."
Even then, coach Weatherington says that her program came close to missing out. "The volcano that erupted in Iceland was causing all sorts of problems with flights," coach Weatherington recalled. "Alyssa's flight out of Baltimore was delayed due to the volcanic ash. Thankfully, we were able to get her here."
Lang knew KSU the moment she laid eyes on campus. "I fell in love with Kennesaw the second I saw the cobblestone sign up by the old soccer field. I just realized, `Wow, this is neat!'"
"When I came on my visit, I made sure I did everything," Lang said. "I played a little bit of volleyball with the girls that were here. I asked them to tell me how the coaching staff really was. I made sure they had my major of Human Services."
The relationship that would develop between player and coach was perhaps the most vital reason Lang chose Kennesaw State. "I was really drawn to the fact that coach Weatherington was here, she was new, and she was turning the program around for the better and I could contribute to the program some way," Lang said of the woman who would be her head coach for the following two seasons. "I knew she was tough, she was fair, and she had a lot of discipline to her style of coaching. It attracted me because I knew that was the style of coaching I needed my whole life, or if not that I needed, what I wanted. I knew she would make me a better player and a better person."
Lang's impact on the court would be almost immediate. In her third match with the Owls, the then-junior set a program record with 19 kills in a three-set loss to Southern Miss. Just over one month later, Lang had 21 kills in a sweep of North Florida to set a new Atlantic Sun Conference record for kills in a three-set A-Sun match. Lang would earn her first A-Sun Player of the Week award following the UNF match. At the end of 2010, a season in which the Owls earned second place in the conference, Lang would earn Second Team A-Sun All-Conference honors.
When one talks to Lang, one can get the sense that the bitter taste in her mouth that appeared after her sophomore year of high school may have come back to the forefront. While she earned A-Sun All-Tournament honors last year, the Owls fell short of a conference championship. In preseason, Lang told teammates anything short of winning the conference championship this year would be a bust.
"I need to win this championship. I will remember this for the rest of my life," Lang said almost breathlessly. "I want it that bad. If I think about it, I’ll start sweating and envisioning the plays. And I’ll sit there and stare at the wall. I’m just so ready to play the final match right then and there."
"Alyssa is tenacious in everything she does," said coach Weatherington. "If she gets her focus on something, she will do everything in her power to reach that. Sometimes that can throw people a bit. When it comes from someone so young who is so finite in what she wants to do, it can be intimidating."
This has been a very uneven season for Lang for a variety of reasons. The loss of her great-grandmother as the season started meant Lang couldn't be with her team for the season opener against Charlotte. In warm-ups against Georgia, a collision with a teammate knocked Lang to the court with a separated shoulder. After recovering from that, a stomach virus had Lang in an increasingly nauseous state following each of KSU's wins over Jacksonville and North Florida. Through it all, Lang has learned to lean on her teammates for support. "I love every one of those girls in the locker room dearly," she said. "They are the first real taste of what a family is supposed to be like. I know there are times I annoy them, and I know there are times that they annoy me. But I know deep down we really care for each other and we all want to win the A-Sun Championship."
So while Lang reached her 1,000th kill Oct. 8, it's really her 1,000th dig that will be the best individual mark she could reach. "There's nothing quite like when someone thinks they've hit that perfect shot and you can take it away from them. When they think they’ve hit the spot and they’ve got that kill and I’m right there. There's nothing quite like taking that shot away."
Still, the ability to hold that trophy for the 2011 A-Sun Champion means more to Lang than any individual accolade ever would. "I want nothing more in my life than to add another spectacular championship memory to my collection because this one will mean the most than any of them combined," Lang said. "I know that I've got the perfect group right here at Kennesaw State to make that memory with."
