George Washington University Athletics
Holmes Wins Gold Medal with Team USA at FIVB World Championship
9/24/2019 2:03:00 PM | Women's Volleyball
GW Volleyball assistant aids in first-of-its-kind finish for USA Volleyball
WASHINGTON - Outside of the senior team, USA Volleyball had never won a gold medal at any age-grouped world championship. That was the goal for the 2019 U-18 team that featured GW volleyball associate head coach Nicki Holmes on staff.
And the dream became a reality in mid-September when Holmes and the U.S. celebrated the title at the 2019 FIVB U-18 World Championship.
"Anytime you can put yourself out there on a stage where you can claim it's the best competition you'll ever see and just lay it out there and see where it sticks, it's probably the highlight of my career," Holmes said. "You don't create those environments often. It was cool to be a part of, and I'm just thankful they even allow me to be in the room."
Holmes has been involved with USA Volleyball for the last 14 years and had previously represented the country at tournaments overseas in Puerto Rico, Italy, and Honduras.
This tournament, though, was part of a long organizational quest after the U-18 team finished second at the world championship in 2013 and 2015.
The journey began over the summer for Holmes with a training camp in Colorado Springs, Colo., and then a day of practice with the team in Los Angeles before flying halfway across the world to Egypt for the tournament.
Facing teams that boast professional athletes, even at the U-18 level, the challenges were apparent.
"Most of (our athletes) are going to play in college," Holmes said. "These teams we're playing are paid to play. We're not. It was cool to see how we competed and took on that challenge."
To overcome the supposed disadvantage, Holmes and the staff focused on a series of mini-goals instead of stating the long-term goal up front, an approach also used at GW.
"We just focused on them having to work and be just one percent better every day, which we do here as well," Holmes said. "We had such a limited time to train that we had to focus on training while playing.
"We emphasized that the whole of the team together is going to be better than the six opponents across the net. For the age they are and for all the adversities we had to face – flying to a different country, being 12 hours away, locked in a hotel room because we weren't allowed to leave – they took that head on and embraced the challenge."
The U.S. made it out of the group stage with a five-set loss to Italy as the only blemish. Once in the knockout stage, the Americans bested the host Egypt before topping Japan and Brazil to set up a rematch with Italy in the final.
"We knew it was going to be a different element," Holmes said. "We already knew we were getting a medal, but there was elusive gold as we had never won before. Plus, it was Italy, who had already beaten us before."
The match ended up going five, and the U.S. found themselves trailing early in the deciding set. That's when the lessons of mini-goals proved to be their most worthwhile.
"It's tough in the time, but looking back on it, they never thought about the score," Holmes said. "It's really a tough lesson to tell teams to not look at the score, but worry about the next point. These kids were resilient to just push forward and get better. They were still focused on getting better in the fifth set of the championship match."
A block at the net ended the match and set off a long-awaited celebration for Holmes and USA Volleyball as a whole. It also set a new standard for the organization with an Olympic year on the horizon in 2020.
"I don't think I'm driven to be with USA Volleyball just to win things with them," Holmes said. "I'm more driven because the end result is trying to achieve some type of greatness, whatever that looks like. This happens to be an example of excellence and greatness.
"As we look forward to an Olympic year, are we driving a pipeline towards an end goal of trying to get an Olympic gold? That's what drives me back to being a part of the national team. I get to one, be a part of that and two, bring it back to my own career and aim to bring examples to help motivate our team (at GW)."
And the dream became a reality in mid-September when Holmes and the U.S. celebrated the title at the 2019 FIVB U-18 World Championship.
"Anytime you can put yourself out there on a stage where you can claim it's the best competition you'll ever see and just lay it out there and see where it sticks, it's probably the highlight of my career," Holmes said. "You don't create those environments often. It was cool to be a part of, and I'm just thankful they even allow me to be in the room."
Holmes has been involved with USA Volleyball for the last 14 years and had previously represented the country at tournaments overseas in Puerto Rico, Italy, and Honduras.
This tournament, though, was part of a long organizational quest after the U-18 team finished second at the world championship in 2013 and 2015.
The journey began over the summer for Holmes with a training camp in Colorado Springs, Colo., and then a day of practice with the team in Los Angeles before flying halfway across the world to Egypt for the tournament.
Facing teams that boast professional athletes, even at the U-18 level, the challenges were apparent.
"Most of (our athletes) are going to play in college," Holmes said. "These teams we're playing are paid to play. We're not. It was cool to see how we competed and took on that challenge."
To overcome the supposed disadvantage, Holmes and the staff focused on a series of mini-goals instead of stating the long-term goal up front, an approach also used at GW.
"We just focused on them having to work and be just one percent better every day, which we do here as well," Holmes said. "We had such a limited time to train that we had to focus on training while playing.
"We emphasized that the whole of the team together is going to be better than the six opponents across the net. For the age they are and for all the adversities we had to face – flying to a different country, being 12 hours away, locked in a hotel room because we weren't allowed to leave – they took that head on and embraced the challenge."
The U.S. made it out of the group stage with a five-set loss to Italy as the only blemish. Once in the knockout stage, the Americans bested the host Egypt before topping Japan and Brazil to set up a rematch with Italy in the final.
"We knew it was going to be a different element," Holmes said. "We already knew we were getting a medal, but there was elusive gold as we had never won before. Plus, it was Italy, who had already beaten us before."
The match ended up going five, and the U.S. found themselves trailing early in the deciding set. That's when the lessons of mini-goals proved to be their most worthwhile.
"It's tough in the time, but looking back on it, they never thought about the score," Holmes said. "It's really a tough lesson to tell teams to not look at the score, but worry about the next point. These kids were resilient to just push forward and get better. They were still focused on getting better in the fifth set of the championship match."
A block at the net ended the match and set off a long-awaited celebration for Holmes and USA Volleyball as a whole. It also set a new standard for the organization with an Olympic year on the horizon in 2020.
"I don't think I'm driven to be with USA Volleyball just to win things with them," Holmes said. "I'm more driven because the end result is trying to achieve some type of greatness, whatever that looks like. This happens to be an example of excellence and greatness.
"As we look forward to an Olympic year, are we driving a pipeline towards an end goal of trying to get an Olympic gold? That's what drives me back to being a part of the national team. I get to one, be a part of that and two, bring it back to my own career and aim to bring examples to help motivate our team (at GW)."
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