FAMU volleyball prepare to defend SWAC title by challenging themselves early in season

As Florida A&M volleyball plans to hold on to its SWAC championship, the season's onset will begin at home when they host West Florida in an exhibition game on Friday.

With most of the team returning, head coach Gokhan Yilmaz believes that the chemistry and undoubted talent will allow them to reach the same heights of a season ago.

Since the Rattlers began practice on Aug. 9 to prepare for their first game as one of the main focus has been getting the influx new transfers adapted to a new system.

"Practice has been very productive," Yilmaz said.

"We bring back a very good group and the transfers fit in very well to address our immediate and future needs.

"We have a very competitive group and they've been going after it pretty hard."

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New homes

During the offseason, FAMU volleyball added five new transfers to its roster.

It's stacked.

Sophomore outside hitter Brooke Lynn Watts won the Ohio Valley Conference Freshman of the Year a season ago while playing at Murray State. Senior defensive specialist Brooke Hudson comes from Colorado State as a former Mountain West Champion in 2019.

Junior Jada Taylor holds the distinction of the only transfer with SWAC experience, playing at Grambling State - a team that the Rattlers that will meet on Oct. 9 in Huntsville, Alabama.

Nina Sharpton (North Carolina State) and Aja Jones (Florida Gulf Coast) rounds out the new additions.

"What we're trying to recruit are kids that are serious about academics and want to play high-level volleyball," Yilmaz said.

"With us having success on the court and FAMU being one of the best HBCU's in the country and being in Florida are facts that affect those decisions."

Taylor has always had FAMU on her mind, knowing the history of the program being a HBCU volleyball powerhouse under Tony Trifonov.

"They've kind of always been on my radar," Taylor said.

"They were fundamentally sound and a good school for me academically. They go by that 'FAMULY' slogan and I appreciate that."

In the spring 2021 season, Taylor earned the SWAC Libero of the Year honor. Her defensive prowess will be valuable to the Rattlers' success.

"It's all about your competitiveness," she said.

"Being a defensive player, you always got that pressure on your back and want to put up a good ball for your team.

"I'm bringing that all the time, no matter where I go."

Staying on top

Third time was the charm for Yilmaz as he led FAMU to it's first conference title since 2009 by winning the SWAC in his third season as head coach and the team's first season in the SWAC.

Winning it all is hard. But repeating is harder.

Therefore, before the Rattlers even sniff SWAC play, they will play 14 games. This includes the crosstown Florida State and SEC's Ole Miss.

"I'm excited to see how the season goes as we start by playing these harder games to prepare us for our conference play," defending SWAC Player of the Year Dominque Washington said.

"We have a new and really good group with a lot of incoming transfers. We've really meshed well and it's only been about two weeks.

"We're staying humble and not putting too much pressure on ourselves because we won, but don't want to overthink it."

Yilmaz knows the difficulty of emulating 2021's success which included a berth to the NCAA Division I National Tournament. The target has been placed on their back.

"It's going to be difficult this year because there's several teams that are bringing back the majority of their rosters," he said.

"The SWAC is moving in the right direction. I think the competition will be better and better as we go along.

"We're talented, but it's a long season. We got to be able to put it together and play enough weekends to be successful."

2022 FLORIDA A&M UNIVERSITY VOLLEYBALL SCHEDULE

Gerald Thomas III covers FAMU athletics for the Tallahassee Democrat. Contact him via email at gdthomas@gannett.com or on Twitter @3peatgee.

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This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: FAMU Volleyball: Tough early schedule being used for SWAC repeat run