Setter hopes hard work pays off

By Paul Trembacki
Sports Editor

Jen Bova had just got done running with her teammates on the Purdue volleyball team.

The conditioning drills for the players who stayed at Purdue this summer had started at 6 a.m., and most people were ready to go back home and rest.

But Bova and teammates Tiffany Yoskey and Lori Knicker wanted more. They entered Ross-Ade Stadium to run up and down the stairs.

"When we first got in there, we were like 'Oh, my gosh; are we going to make it?'" Bova said.

But they did — not because they had to, not because their coach said to and not because they had a death wish. It was because they knew it would make them stronger, faster and, most importantly, better volleyball players.

They would run up every step of all 28 aisles in the U-shaped section of the stadium and come down diagonally across the 73 row seats to the beginning of the next aisle.

"It was tough," Bova said. "The last three you can't even feel your legs."

And as if that wasn't enough, the group would rest for a few hours and then work out again in the late afternoon, exercising for half an hour to an hour to a Tae-Bo tape and then playing pick-up games of volleyball in the gym.

That was the scenario nearly every weekday this summer for the trio of players, with the types of workouts varying but the degree of difficulty remaining on the high end. Sometimes Bova, Yoskey and Knicker would run the 3 1/2 -mile loop around the Purdue golf courses as a break from the Ross-Ade stairs.

Bova, a sophomore, lost 10 pounds during the summer and said she was hardly ever sore during two- and three-a-day practices this month. And while Yoskey and Knicker hope to play more significant roles on the team this season, there's no doubt that Bova will be playing a lot. After all, she's the only setter on the team.

Purdue coach Jeff Hulsmeyer, in his third year at Purdue, said Bova is perhaps the strongest, most competitive setter he's had here.

"She's the type of player you love to coach because she'll run through a wall for you and keep coming back for more," Hulsmeyer said.

But he knew she had that in her ever since 1998 when he was an assistant coach at Illinois and Bova was only a sophomore at Divine Savior Holy Angels High School in Milwaukee.

Hulsmeyer met Jen when he was recruiting her older sister, Kris. Kris eventually went to Florida, where she is a senior starter on the volleyball team. But Hulsmeyer found Jen, whom he eventually signed as his first recruit at Purdue, so the time he spent with the Bova family wasn't a waste.

Hulsmeyer knew Bova was a hard worker and that she would learn quickly. Last season, she played in 47 of Purdue's 114 games and averaged 6.6 assists per game.

Because the setter position in volleyball is like the point guard position in basketball — the players at the position coordinate most of the offense — Bova must be trusted and she must trust her teammates.

According to both Bova and Hulsmeyer, that's not a problem.

"She's a great team player," said Hulsmeyer. "She takes a lot on her shoulders."

Apparently so. She's still getting in 30 extra minutes of cardiovascular work each day after practice.

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Setter hopes hard work pays off

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Sports editor:
Paul Trembacki

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