HALLIE BENM-HORIN: Standing out

Hallie Ben-Horin is a stand-out volleyball player without a stand-out skill. That has made the senior co-captain very useful for the Quakers throughout her four years. Wherever there is a weakness in the team, just plug in Ben-Horin and watch as that weakness becomes a strength. "She has all the basic skills down," senior Keri Gibson said. "She's just a good, solid player and that makes her versatile. She can just step into any role and excel." Penn coach Margaret Feeney has not hesitated changing Ben-Horin's position often throughout her career. She was a setter her freshman year, and a right-side defensive specialist as a sophomore and junior. This year, Penn needed to fill the outside-hitter position when all-Ivy selection Devon Austin graduated. Feeney turned to Ben-Horin, of course. She has responded by leading the team in digs and aces, and placing near the top in kills. "She's really playing well," Feeney said. "She's a smart hitter. I think a lot of the other teams look at our outside hitter and sees its small, but she's really doing a good job. " For the 5-foot-7 Ben-Horin, playing outside hitter is completing a circle of sorts. She grew up in Phoenix, Ariz., and played outside hitter for Camelback High school as a freshman. This was not just a regular high school team. During Ben-Horin's tenure, Camelback won the state championship three times. "We were really lucky that we had really good athletes," Ben-Horin said. "Spirit wise -- there was so much more in high school. I think there was more school spirit because it's smaller." The only other freshman to make the varsity squad was Ben-Horin's best friend, Liz Martin. Martin, who is now the captain of George Washington's volleyball team, remembers well the opening of state finals during freshman year. "On the very first point in the state finals, we we're both so nervous," Martin said. "We both called a ball out and the ball landed right in the middle of us." Despite that shaky beginning, Camelback still persevered and won the state championship. Martin said it was in Ben-Horin's junior year, when she led the team to a state championship as its setter, that Ben-Horin became a leader. "We were expected to win," Martin said, "but we were still relatively young because we were playing with four juniors and one senior. As a setter, she was young and she was in a hard position. But she did a great job. I think she carried the team just by her leadership and just by being a smart player." When Ben-Horin first came to Penn after her glorious high-school career, she couldn't blend in with the freshman volleyball players at pre-camp. She was the only freshman who Feeney was able to recruit. "Hallie was my first recruiting class," Feeney said. "And being new to the Ivy League, I was too honest with my recruits. She was the only recruited athlete I got." Ben-Horin said it was hard for the first two weeks until freshman walk-ons Gibson, Jennifer Richmond and Beatriz Rodriguez came to the team. Now seniors, Ben-Horin and the walk-ons form the core of the vaunted defense. But while Gibson, Richmond and Rodriguez are defensive specialists, Ben-Horin is an everything specialist. Ben-Horin explained her versatility this way: "I guess because I'm steady and consistent. I don't have any one thing that's really, really good. Nothing really stands out." Nothing, except Hallie Ben-Horin.