Grow­ing On and Off the Court
BY GEOFF GOYNE

Brekke and Choice

IN THE FALL OF 2006, Wes­ley Col­lege fielded the first var­sity vol­ley­ball pro­gram since mov­ing into the Divi­sion III era. The Wolver­ines won nine games that sea­son with a ros­ter of mostly fresh­men and the pro­gram looked to have a solid foun­da­tion. Fresh­man Lilia Brekke earned All-Pennsylvania Ath­letic Con­fer­ence sec­ond team hon­ors. One of her class­mates, Net­tie Choice, paced the con­fer­ence in blocks. Then every­thing changed. And then it changed again.

In the program’s first three years, there were three dif­fer­ent coaches. There was not a revolv­ing door just on the coach’s office, but on the locker room as well. A total of 27 dif­fer­ent play­ers had suited up for the Wolver­ines. The only con­stants were Brekke and Choice.

“It was def­i­nitely hard,” Brekke remarked. “It put a lot of stress on Net­tie and me.”

“We came into every sea­son expect­ing a new coach,” Choice added. “It was very unsta­ble. The two of us just got used to it.”

It took until their senior year to play for the same coach for two con­sec­u­tive sea­sons. As one might expect, this brought the duo closer, on and off the court, espe­cially since they were being looked to for pri­mary lead­er­ship as early as their sopho­more seasons.

“Play­ing with Net­tie so much, we know each other inside and out, on and off the court,” Brekke said. “It made the two of us play together really well and that’s helped the team while the new play­ers have learned to play together.”

If the bond could be made stronger, the two even line up next to each other with Choice play­ing mid­dle hit­ter and Brekke on the out­side. “I got used to look­ing to the left and always see­ing her there,” Choice noted.

While it may seem obvi­ous they would hold vir­tu­ally every career record for the young pro­gram, it cer­tainly has not been by default. The pair has racked up nearly every sea­son record as well. Between them, they have racked up eight of the top 10 kill totals and five of the six best block totals. Brekke also has the sea­son record for digs.

The career totals add up well too. Both play­ers tal­lied over 550 career kills. Brekke added 222 aces and 934 digs while Choice patrolled the net for 449 blocks.

Despite play­ing their final match in the blue and white this Octo­ber, the two young women see a bright future ahead for the pro­gram. Aside from the two senior cap­tains, the rest of the ros­ter has been made up of entirely fresh­men and sopho­mores. The two agree that the recent con­sis­tency with Head Coach Gerry Szabo has been a wel­come change. It also has been ben­e­fi­cial for the pro­gram in order to recruit the next genera­tion of vol­ley­ball players.

“We have play­ers who came here to play vol­ley­ball,” Choice observed. “Before we just worked with whomever we had. Some­times peo­ple were learn­ing to play.”

“The group we have now is going to be able to grow and develop together,” added Brekke.

Some­thing else they agree on is that more than the vol­ley­ball, the rela­tion­ships they have built with each other and their team­mates are what they will remem­ber most after they leave Wesley.

“There are girls on this team I’d call my sis­ters,” Choice said. “It’s like a family.”

For Choice and Brekke, their career paths on the court cer­tainly have had more twists and turns than those of their peers on Wesley’s more estab­lished ath­letic teams. Despite the turbu­lent begin­nings for the pro­gram, how­ever, the vol­ley­ball team has now reached a plateau. In addi­tion, the two stand­outs have emerged stronger than ever, in their game and their friendship.

“Look­ing back,” Brekke said, “I wouldn’t have it any other way.”