Volleyball Newcomer Q&A: Alyiah Wells
8/22/2019 3:07:00 PM | Volleyball
We will be posting Q&As with each of the eight newcomers on this year's Alabama volleyball team as they head into the 2019 season. Our third Q&A is with Alyiah Wells from Memphis, Tenn.
How did you get your start playing volleyball?
"My mom played volleyball at Austin Peay and always liked it. Growing up, you try every single sport. Basketball was my primary sport at first. My dad played professional basketball. He didn't push me towards basketball though, he was actually the one who encouraged me to try other sports."
When did you realize you could potentially play at the college level?
"At first, I didn't want to try out for club volleyball since I already played AAU basketball all year. After I made the team, I realized I couldn't do both, it was a big time commitment. I was already taller than everybody by middle school. I was about 5'11" in sixth grade and hit 6'0" by high school."
What colleges were you looking at initially?
"As I got older, more schools from across the country started to show interest. When I started narrowing it down, I knew my family would want to come see me play. They put so much time and money into me playing over the years, so it was the least I could do to thank them! I'm from Memphis so it's basically in the middle of the SEC."
What interested you in Alabama?
"I didn't want to be at a school in the middle of nowhere. Tuscaloosa has plenty of places to shop and eat. I visited during the summer, so there weren't any students here. It's a different feel than how it is when everyone is around. But, I was impressed with how nice the facilities were. I feel like that's why my high school was so successful, we always had up-to-date weight rooms and equipment and to get the full student-athlete experience, there's certain resources you need. Seeing the Mal Moore weight room was great. There's always schedule conflicts at other schools because you're sharing facilities but it's not a problem here."
What was your first conversation like with Coach Devine?
"She was very welcoming. I'm glad that all of us got the opportunity to still come after the coaching change because sometimes things like that don't work out. Of course I was anxious about it, but my relationship with her is so strong. She was very adamant about checking in on us. She made sure to build a relationship with us that wasn't centered around volleyball. I don't even thing we talked about volleyball that much.
"About a month after I signed my NLI, I had to have surgery. I knew going into signing day that my leg was hurt so that on top of a coaching change made me really anxious. What if she didn't have faith in me getting better? I called her right before the surgery and she asked about the recovery time and made sure I knew what I had to do to get back ready to play. She never promised me anything, but she never counted me out because of the injury. That meant a lot to me. She's been a motherly figure for me here, I feel like I can talk to her about anything. She pushes me as a person and an athlete."
How has the recover process been?
"I had the surgery in January and then about four months of rehab. I was still lifting and doing workouts but coming here was the first time I did full six-on-six volleyball since the injury. That was nervewracking. People are already trying to count you out because you're a freshman. You want to make your opening statement loud but I was nervous about it. I just had to get out of my own head. It just got better after that. Going back to the resources, our trainer and the rehab here have been really helpful. That's why I feel like I'm doing so well."
What has the transition to college life been like so far?
"I've always done well with time management though because I always had to balance school and club sports in high school since I was playing something all year."
Was it a big adjustment on the court?
"My club team was really good. We played in the national championship twice and I played and practiced with a lot of high-level players. The speed hasn't been a huge adjustment, but you still have to learn to read the hitters. I feel like I was prepared for the intensity of practice, weights and the speed of what we're doing here. You have to learn how to adapt to a lot of things anyway as a student-athlete."
Blocking has been a big focus point in the offseason. What have you had to work on in that regard?
"Coach [Devine] is the first one who has made me swing block. Normally, you do a turn-and-run stack blocking thing. Coming here and learning a new way of blocking after having not done it at all over the years was very hard. It's a completely different thing with timing. She's been really patient with me and they've been really helpful making me comfortable with it. I feel like I'm better as a blocker now than I ever have been. I've always been more of an offensive middle, so I felt like on defense I was tall enough so I could just get up and that would take care of it. Focusing now more on blocking as well as being offensive, they've really helped me up my game."
How has the team meshed so far?
"We're all really close. We were basically the only people here this summer. We got together every day and every weekend. We always ate together before and after practice at the dining hall. It was a fresh start for everyone on the team. The upperclassmen have been really welcoming. They treat us like they've known us forever. Trust is a huge part of a team's success. It makes it so much easier to play with people you genuinely love and I can say I genuinely love everyone on this team.
"I live with the new freshmen so we're all best friends. That transfers onto the court too, because I feel like I can be honest with them and call them out on things and they can do the same to me because we know it's coming from a good place. We hold each other to a high standard and we're hard on each other because we all want to get better."
What are some of your goals heading into the season?
"We're just trusting in the process, taking it day-by-day. We were ranked really low in the SEC so we want to prove people wrong, but we can only do that by being consistent and performing what we've practiced every day. Consistency is one of our biggest things. We want to stay aggressive and give it our all every week. For myself, there are certain numbers I would like to have but that doesn't really matter. I just have to do what the team needs and do my job so it makes everyone else's job easier. I know that if I'm doing what I have to do, then everyone else can do what they need to do. If I perform and give 100-percent effort in practice and in games so that the coaches and players trust me, that's all I want."
