Thirty-six years after removing volleyball from Oklahoma Christian University’s collegiate athletic lineup, the sport will return for the 2019 season.
According to Athletic Director David Lynn, the addition of volleyball has been at the top of his list to bring back to Oklahoma Christian, because of its popularity in Oklahoma and surrounding states.
“We sit in a hotbed for volleyball,” Lynn said. “On top of that, as you look across the similar, faith-based, Church of Christ schools, I think we were the only school really that didn’t have women’s volleyball, so volleyball checks a lot of boxes for us. It serves the student population we want to see come to Oklahoma Christian, it helps serve our existing students, it’s something I think we can be competitive at and it gives us an opportunity to better serve our female student athletes, something that is very important to me and to our administration.”
After deciding to add volleyball, Lynn said he is currently in the process of hiring a coach who will spend this year forming a team before competing in 2019.
“I’m looking for someone who is passionate about volleyball and who wants to change students’ lives, because I really feel like, as a coach at Oklahoma Christian University, you get the opportunity to interact with college students, which is a special opportunity,” Lynn said. “You get the chance to influence them in so many different ways both on and off the court, so I’m looking for someone that that’s their passion.”
Until the university hires a coach and forms a team, Lynn said there are several things to do to prepare for the first season.
“Some of the hurdles we faced were coming up with a home base, like a locker room,” Lynn said. “We had some donors step forward for us to be able to renovate the visitors’ locker room to make that a home base for volleyball. And then some of the upfront costs of just the equipment that goes along with having the sport, we’ve got some donations for that, too.”
For students who gave up dreams of playing collegiate volleyball when they decided to attend Oklahoma Christian, Lynn said the program will also consider current students wanting to join the team.
“I’ve had probably a dozen emails from these students and I’m sure, when the coach gets in place, they’ll have some open tryouts and things like that,” Lynn said. “Whether it’s an open tryout or whether that coach deals with those types of situations one-on-one, they will evaluate all the existing students and if there’s opportunity to add them to the team, that will definitely be their chance to get on the team.”
In the past two years, Oklahoma Christian has added three new sports to its athletic lineup—swimming, bowling and volleyball. Looking forward, Lynn said he would eventually like to see the addition of a competitive cheerleading program on campus.
“For a lot of the same reasons as volleyball, I think we sit in an area where competitive cheer is very popular,” Lynn said. “It’s something that could be very successful as a program at Oklahoma Christian but also add to the experience at all of our games. We’ve had cheerleaders in the past, but we’ve never had an organized competitive program.”
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