Winston-Salem State Head volleyball coach Eric Poitier is optimistic despite having a rough season.
“I’m pleased with what we’ve done,” Poitier said.
“We lost one or two games that I didn’t expect, but that’s the nature of sports. I still believe that we’re on the right track to accomplishing our goal of winning a CIAA championship in the near future.”
WSSU finished with a 9-7 regular season record in the CIAA and made it to the conference championships.
“We were really resilient this year,” Poitier said.
“We had a key injury to the anchor of our defense [Brittany Rich] and that kind of hurt us.”
Poitier said that he is still working to build the type of program he wants.
“In my first two seasons, I’ve focused on getting some players in here,” Poitier said.
“We’re still playing with a relatively young and new team.”
Coach Poitier said that he is very happy with the growth and effort that his players showed throughout the season. The Lady Rams lost their first 14 matches of the season overall and their first five in conference but won nine of their final 17 matchups to end the campaign on a strong note.
“I’m proud of all of them [players],” Poitier said.
Coach said that he is especially proud of his two senior leaders Francesca Edgerton and De-Ann Smith for the way they performed on and off the court.
“They’ve [Edgerton, Smith] both been great players and teammates in the two years that I’ve coached them, and we’re going to hate to see them go,” Poitier said.
Edgerton led the Lady Rams with 277 kills this year, and Smith broke her own school record for blocks in a season, finishing with 108.
Edgerton said that her senior season was a good one. She said that it started out slow in comparison to previous seasons, but her team stepped it up toward the end of the year.
“I’m very happy with the way my team performed this year,” Edgerton said. “Everyone stepped up when we needed to and we all improved. We didn’t start out the way we wanted, but this team has a lot of fight in it.”
Coach Poitier says he is optimistic about next season because of the number of key players that will be returning and the new recruits that will be added to the mix.
Juniors Avoni Seymour and Katelyn Sigala, along with sophomores Kayla Brass and a healthy Brittany Rich are all players that Poitier said he will lean on to bring experience next season.
“With these players returning and some new additions our team could be very strong next year.”
Edited by Pachia Lee