For senior captain Nora Nemec, being a captain doesn’t mean just being a leader; it means being someone everyone is able to talk to on and off the court.

Being junior captain last year, Nemec holds the role of being a captain with more responsibility this year rather than last year. 

“I am the eldest on the court compared to having five other seniors that weren’t captains above me.” said Nemec, “I feel like I hold some more seniority that I need to reflect on my actions in the way I play.

 “Nemec takes more time to think about how she wants to be seen by the underclassmen, and her teammates, looking up to her as a role model on and off the court.

Nemec makes sure the team bonds in a fun way rather than regular activities; instead, the team bonds over burgers.

 “Food, all the time, every time, we all love food, we like talking about food. We like going out to get food together. Everything is food.” Some food that they bond over is mostly used for their strict pregame traditions. 

“It’s always Sour Patch Kids because before our last game last year, Abby gave me Sour Patch Kids, and it was the best game I played all year.” 

More of the pre-game traditions she believes will make her shine on the court is listening to music before the game, specifically “Headlines by Drake.” 

“We are big singers on the team; we always have some song in our head, and it usually ends in a riff off of a Disney song or some other popular song.” This makes the long rides to away games and tournaments fun for the team to scream their favorite songs. 

Nemec takes friendship as a main source of why the Woodland Volleyball team plays the way they do. “Just being a part of the team, all the time, and having and growing such big friendships with so many people, and a bond that will carry on and off the court.” The laughs, funny jokes lasting the whole season, and the bonds built over being with each other for hours on end every day of the fall volleyball season, gave Nemec some of her best friends, and people she trusts the most. 

“We are just so funny all the time. We’re just funny, we make a joke out of everything, and it just makes practice fun because everything’s funny and everything’s a joke.”

Nemec runs the team, making sure she establishes the standard of what the Woodland volleyball legacy is, and making it even better, but making sure each one of the players has something they can look back on and make sure they had a good experience. Making everything a fun experience, even if it’s conditioning, long practices, late nights on game days is vital for Nemec. She can even make the heat of the gym they train in a fun experience. 

“A big inside joke for us is paper fans, which started as a joke because our gym was so hot, but now we all have paper fans that we wave around, which other teams think are crazy for when we have games,” said Nemec. 

Nemec has big plans for this team. 

“I think our team goal is to always go far in NVLS and tournaments but I have so much hope that we can take this team to be NVL champs.”