Kendall Steinert '22 Recruiting Profile

Have you ever tried out for a team you wanted make and you just weren’t good enough?  I tried to start my volleyball career in sixth grade. I showed up to the tryout and quickly learned that I wasn’t as good as the rest of the players. When it came time to announce who made the team, my name wasn’t there. So, I played a short season at the YMCA trying to learn the fundamentals of the game. Seventh grade tryouts came, and I was sure that I had improved from last time. The next day as I was reading down the list of names for this year’s team, I had failed again. After my second failed attempt, I played another season at the YMCA, and right after that, I joined a travel team called Jellys Volleyball. 

During this travel season, I had a coach that inspired me to want to be the best at the sport that I was very quickly, learning to love. I developed a drive and a competitive edge on the court that I had never had before. The most important thing that I learned from him was how to be a setter. Even though we didn’t win many games, I know that that season affected me tremendously. The quote: “I am not what happened to me, I am what I choose to become” really related to the situation that I was in. The drive that I found was exactly what I needed to get where I am today.

After learning so much from my travel ball coach, I tried out for the school team in eighth grade and I finally made it. It was so much fun, I made so many new friends, and I grew really close to the coach. I played middle and never came off of the court. I was named team captain and MVP at the end of the season. That school team made such a big impact on my life, not only for the volleyball part of it, but the self-confidence that I had for myself in the end. 

Knowing that I had grown so much in just a few months, I wanted to do another season of travel ball next. My mom was the coach and all of my teammates were really good. We won a few medals and a lot of games. I learned how important it was to be a good teammate on and off the court.  

Middle school was over and I was off to high school and started my freshman year at Venice High. If you were a volleyball player that lived in the city of Venice, it was tradition to play for the high school team. It was very scary because in the past years, they were very successful. Coach Brian Wheatley led them to five state championships. I was very nervous going in because it was so different from what I was used to. It became more about competing with each other rather than against another team. By the end of the summer workouts, I was sure that I was good enough to be on JV, but again I was disappointed. They made me the starting setter of the freshman team. We ended up running a 5-1 rotation with me as the only setter. We had a really challenging season, and even though I didn’t enjoy it as much, I just kept thinking, if I keep working hard, I’ll get better. After that season, I didn’t love the game as much and after the summer workouts, I had lost the joy of the game completely. 

I decided to stick with it for another year of club ball and was brought up to the sixteen elite team. It was such a great opportunity to be coached by the best coach I could ever ask for. Coach Krause gave me my confidence back and showed me how much I really did love the game. He has taught me so much from being the best volleyball player, to being a great christian and a great person. 

Travel ball ended with a great season and it was time to start school ball again, but I really wasn’t looking forward to putting up with the same people again for another whole season at Venice High. I couldn’t risk losing my love for the game again. I knew that Imagine School at North Port had a pretty good volleyball team and a few of my friends were moving there from Port Charlotte. It took a lot of thinking because I still live in Venice and it is a long drive, but it was the best decision that my family and I have ever made. I was named Athlete of the Week in the Charlotte Sun newspaper in the beginning of the season, I made the All Area team by the end, and I was named MVP for the season. I had the best time of my life. We ended the season with a 23-3 record and I, personally, set a new record for myself of 567 assists. I’ve been so happy with the move to this new school.

I know that I’m going to have a lot of hard decisions in my life, but this experience has helped me to know for a fact that if I pray about it, God will give me the answer and lead me in the direction that He wants me to go.