Sofia Rivero '21 Recruiting Profile

I have been playing volleyball since 7^th grade. I didn’t know how much I wanted to play collegiately until eight grade. That year I was put on the JV team at my school, which strictly used to be only for ninth-eleventh graders and I remember thinking wow my coaches think that I have the potential to be great. I started that year really thinking about possibly playing college volleyball. I played basketball for 5 years and ran track but nothing was like playing volleyball. So, I started looking up to this older girl at my school, she was an amazing volleyball player and I wanted to be just like her.  She was on a national team, was having college offers, and she had so much dedication and passion for the sport, that I was just in awe. I later had to move schools, due to my dad’s job and I continued to play volleyball. I am a very versatile player over my 5 years of playing volleyball I have gone from a right-side hitter, to a ds, to an outside hitter, and even a middle hitter. My freshman year I was a starter on the JV team and later a starter on my club team and continued to play on the JV team again my sophomore year. However, things took a turn for me my sophomore year; I decided that wanted a change and left my high school team with a week left in the season and did not play club that year, to pursue cheerleading. I had cheered when I was little and had always wanted to go back but never did until then.  But after a while something felt off and I decided to come back to volleyball this year, my junior year.  

I am quite the perfectionist; I tend to be very hard on myself and strive for nothing but excellence. I am constantly wanting to push myself and improve not only in athletics, but in academics as well. My freshman year I was taking almost all standard classes and I moved to almost all honors and aps my sophomore and junior year. Just recently this year I played club volleyball, worked part time, and was a cheerleader all at the same time, while maintaining a 4.1 weighted gpa.

In volleyball, you are constantly working hard to become better, constantly having to fix your platform, work on your technique, or your approach, and I just love knowing that I can always be improving and better. But what I love most is once you have it down there is nothing like getting that perfect pancake, dig or kill. It feels like for one second, for one play, that any weight of the world you are carrying is no longer there and you can do anything—it is because of this that I came back to volleyball my junior year. Volleyball is and has been the one thing that I can always count on to make me happy; it is almost my sanctuary. I want to play college volleyball because of not only the love that I have for the sport but, the love that I have for getting that kill and celebrating with my team and uniting with my team for one common goal (to play volleyball)—it’s those special moments of satisfaction that make the constant hard work worthwhile.