In the midst of distance learning and social distancing, Bluffton sports teams have had to figure out new and effective ways to stay connected and active.
Volleyball Head Coach Steve Yarnell said the team and coaches have worked hard to stay connected through email, social media and Zoom meetings.
Yarnell realized doing a full team meeting on Zoom meant there was an abundance of people and a smaller floor for people to feel comfortable to share on, so he knew he had to do something different to encourage the students to talk and bond with each other.
The volleyball team shares how they are doing and spending time with each other during an all-team meeting. Photo courtesy of Steve Yarnell.
“We went ahead and broke the team down; we had three captains that we had already named, so I took each one of those captains and gave them about six or seven girls,” said Yarnell. “We call them our ‘colonies,’ and a family of beavers is a colony. And so they each had their own colony of girls to check in with once a week. Some of the questions that they talk about and ask are just some ideas that we had given them, [like] ‘show us something at home that is too big for you to bring to school but it’s like your favorite thing.’ So, to give them more than just, you know, talking about volleyball or school or the coronavirus.”
Yarnell said that some of the incoming freshmen have joined in on their Zoom meetings to join in some team bonding and to further solidify the team camaraderie during a time of such uncertainty.
Haley Horstman, assistant coach for the women’s basketball team, explained the women’s basketball team has also been using Zoom to stay connected with each other throughout the week. Workouts are posted twice a week, and while it’s considered optional, it helps encourage the team to stay active during the quarantine.
“The thing I like the most that I’ve noticed is that several girls have texted me and been like, ‘Hey is there something I could be doing?’ or asking for extra things to do to get better or better themselves for next year,” said Horstman. “So, that makes me excited as a coach because even though they’re not on campus and they don’t have a court and they don’t have access to a weight room right now, they’re still texting and asking for extra things to do or extra ways to get better.”
She said many women on the team have started back to the summer jobs they normally have after school lets out to help keep them busy, stay active and earn some money.
Head coach of the baseball team, James Grandey, said the baseball team has been meeting on Tuesdays and Thursdays via Zoom to go over many things they would usually need to go over at this point in the semester.
Occasionally, the Zoom meetings get split up into smaller groups according to position to help make the conversations more specific.
Grandey said they’ve worked to stay connected with each other, to help talk with the men in establishing their new routine and to make sure the players are showing up to classes.
Grandey knows it has been a hard transition and having to work through the grief of moving off campus but also through losing their whole season.
Bluffton Baseball team listens to a former assistant coach Aaron Hutchison, as he talks about what he is doing now in the world of business. Photo courtesy of James Grandey.
“Recently, I had one of my former assistant coaches log into our Zoom and talk to the team about what he does now in the business world, and how what they’re doing will help them in the future,” said Grandey.
He had all the players write down and share why they were college athletes and why they were at college in general. Grandey said sometimes, when people struggle, they have to get back to remembering why they wanted to do those things in the first place.
Yarnell shared with the struggle of pushing through.
“I think it’s hard to be self-motivated, and I think it really probably reinforces how important it is to have people in your lives,” said Yarnell. “And I’ve heard from a lot of [the students], ‘I really miss Bluffton.’ I think it gives them another layer of grit and toughness, that like, this is another really big challenge and how do they respond and that’s what we get measured on a lot of times is how do you respond to adversity.”
Horstman said the women on her team have been able to reach out to her through text to share how they’re doing and what they’re going through.
“I kind of feel like they can confide in me when they need something, and they aren’t as hesitant to reach out,” said Horstman. “I think they’ve been doing a really good job though, adapting to the change for the most part and just trying to make the most positivity out of it that they can.”
