New South County Girls Volleyball Coach Has Great Expectations

Most athletes can’t say that an injury playing the sport they love caused them to become even more passionate about it.

Trista Barnhart is one of the few who can. Though a multi-sport athlete in college, volleyball is Barnhart’s passion. Earlier this month, she accepted the position as head coach of the girls’ volleyball team at South County Secondary School.

“It was a very nice birthday present, I would say,” she said.

After waking up one morning during the preseason of her sophomore year at John Carroll University, Barnhart found her knee was twice the size it should have been, in what was eventually found to be a hamstring injury. She decided to take the season off to rehab and to also prepare for track in the winter and spring.

Barnhart then decided to take off the junior season as well to focus on track and her studies. When she came back to play volleyball in her senior year, she had to reinvent her game, switching positions from an outside hitter to a defensive specialist.

“It made me work for my spot,” she said. “I was battling freshmen for that position. So there were games I played and then times where I sat the whole game.”

Because of the switch in positions, Barnhart worked side-by-side with her coach learning the ins and outs, eventually leading to her becoming the freshman volleyball coach at Lake Braddock Secondary School.

“(The injury) made me who I am today now that I look back on it,” she said. “If I didn’t come back my senior year, I don’t know if I would have coached volleyball.”

“Working with the coach on the sideline and in practices, I was able to see things that I wasn’t seeing before. And I thought, ‘Oh, I can teach that. I can get girls to do that.’”

Barnhart, who was named South County’s coach on her 26th birthday, has spent the past four years at Lake Braddock. She coached the freshmen in 2007 and from 2008 to 2010 she coached the JV team; she also served as assistant coach on the varsity team in 2010.

She takes over a program that has only been around since 2005, but has achieved tremendous success in that short time. Over the past three seasons, the Stallions have gone 60-13, including winning the Patriot District and Northern Region championships in 2009.

But Barnhart knows success; Lake Braddock won the Patriot District championship in 2010.

“I think it’s a great, competitive program and something I feel very lucky to have stepped into,” Barnhart said. “I’m very excited for what I see returning. The JV team went undefeated; obviously they’re doing something right. Those are going to be the girls that are going to step up to the next level. They are going to be kind of like my co-coaches. I’m going to put a lot of responsibility on them.”

Barnhart isn’t shy about her expectations for next season.

“We’re going to do the best that we can,” she said. “And I see it as we will win the District; we will get a great seed in Regional tournament and go on to the state tournament. It just really depends on how hard we work and how well we work together.”