Volleyball Head Coach Arlisa Hagan Williams won’t have to worry about her players opting for senior dis-orientation over practice this week.

With three freshmen, six sophomores, two juniors and exactly zero seniors on the squad, Williams’ bunch is short on experience and unlikely to amass too many wins, but is nevertheless still excited about an opportunity for development. With at least four sophomores on the court for nearly every game, the second-year players will be responsible for determining the team’s path.

“We bring a lot of talent in [the sophomore] class,” Williams says, “and they all bring something different.”

Junior setter Caitlin Boland leads the way as the team’s captain, but with such a young team, there are plenty of opportunities for individuals to step up. Boland has not played much this season as she nurses an injured knee, and the sophomores have been left with the task of leading themselves on the floor.

“It’s a different dynamic,” sophomore middle blocker Courtney Cohen says. “There are plenty of opportunities for people to take a chance and lead at their position on the court because there aren’t any upperclassmen taking those roles.”

“It seems like we’ve been put into an upper-class position as sophomores and normally that wouldn’t happen, but it’s worked out pretty well,” sophomore outside hitter Kortney Robinson says.

Robinson is the team’s most vocal leader. At the beginning of each game and after every point, Robinson is the first to encourage her teammates. For a team with two wins and eight losses thus far, positive energy can fade fast. Robinson is looking to prevent that.

“I try to play with a lot of energy because I know that when we play with a lot of energy, we play better,” she said after Sunday’s 3-1 win against Iona. “If I see someone else down I know it’s going to hurt the team so I try and pick everyone up. Everyone does that at different times I just may be a little louder at times.”

Her teammates laugh and Robinson smirks – they all know Robinson is the loudest all the time.

Outside hitter and part-time libero Jessica Hardy resides, perhaps, at the other end of the spectrum. More introspective and shy, Hardy has logged most of her minutes this season as a libero because of her passing skills, but considers her natural position to be outside hitter.

“I enjoy outside more. I like being aggressive on offense,” she says.

This past week, Georgetown was struggling at the outside and Williams moved Hardy to fill the hole. She tallied 29 kills over two matches but will almost certainly make the jump back to libero again this season.

“Jessie Hardy is an outside hitter at heart but she really takes one for the team when we need her in the back because of her passing skills,” Williams says.

Hardy understands her role and her value to the team at libero. “We like to lead by example,” the soft-spoken sophomore says.

Hardy is unsure where she will be playing each match – Williams announces the lineups the day of the match – but she understands the growing pains of the young team.

“We’re experimenting but we’re still looking for the right lineup until we don’t lose any games,” Hardy says.

Sophomore defensive specialist Allison Kern may be part of the lineup that frees Hardy to play outside more often. The Illinois native could have joined the team fall of freshman year but had already decided not to play a sport in college.

“Then I went through fall semester and I had way to much free time,” she says, “so I decided to try out.”

Robinson starts talking as soon as Kern stops, as if she needs to fill every moment of silence. “And we’re so glad she did,” she says, smiling and throwing her arm around the 5-foot-4 libero.

Bottom line for Georgetown, however, is that with such an inexperienced nucleus, improvements made this season are unlikely to manifest themselves in the team’s win-loss mark.

“We’re such a young, competitive group,” right-side hitter Kiersten McKoy says. “We all have that competitive drive to win even if we’re not winning right now.”

Middle blocker Courtney Cohen knows her team will be outgunned at times this season.

“We’ve only got one win under our belt so we need to focus on things we can do,” she said before the team’s second win of the season on Sunday. “Energy, focus and high peppiness are things we can control so we make sure we do them well.”

Robinson sees this year as a chance to learn and do things as sophomores that are usually reserved for juniors and seniors. She expects next year’s squad, led by two seniors, to be significantly better.

“I’m really excited, especially for the next coming year because Kit [Niesen] and Kate [Boland] will be seniors and coming into this season we have such good team chemistry . We just need to get better at the skills and get together on the court.”