For sophomore outside hitter Jenna Garner, playing volleyball was always in her blood.
Garner, who played in 20 of the 23 games across her debut season, has always had a soft spot for the court from a young age. Growing up in Pasadena, Calif., she picked up the sport by watching her sister, Abby, play.
“My dad would coach [Abby] in the backyard, and we would always pepper [together],” Garner said. “So I kind of just naturally got into it.”
When she was old enough to join club volleyball, she fell in love with the sport. During high school, the level of club volleyball became extremely competitive — and as Garner excelled, collegiate volleyball was the natural next step. But deciding where she wanted to go to college at 16, however, was overwhelming.
“I made sure to take my time with the process, [and] make sure I was going to a school that was good for my academics and also my sport,” Garner said.
After a month and a half of talking with the coaches and team at Penn, she settled on committing to the Red and Blue. With Penn boasting a strong academic curriculum alongside a strong volleyball program and coaches, Garner believes she found her home on the team.
While playing on a collegiate level required a certain amount of adjustment, Garner was quick to adapt. Being a student-athlete at Penn meant balancing a rigorous course load with intense training. A day-in-the-life generally involves waking up early and starting classes at 8:30 a.m. After a good meal, she gets treatment done before starting an intense three-hour long practice. She then grabs dinner with a friend and spends time completing her homework, and, if she has time, watches an episode of Breaking Bad before going to bed.
“I did notice when I played my freshman year that the ball was coming at me a lot faster, just because girls were stronger,” Garner said. “It took a while to get used to, but I think I adjusted pretty quickly.”
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In her freshman season, Garner has left her mark with her consistent performances. She finished fourth on the team with 134 digs, 68 kills, 27 assists and 16 service aces. For coach Tyler Hagstrom, Garner’s strength lay in her versatility on the court, and her ability to embrace high pressure moments.
“[Garner] can pass, she can play defense well, she has done some great jobs attacking, and got some big blocks,” Hagstrom said. “Her biggest strength is just being a really well rounded, level player.”
“I want the ball more when it’s kind of going down, just so I can feel like I’m helping the team more,” Garner added. “I try to talk more as well, because I feel like when the game tends not to go your way, it gets very quiet out there, so the first way to snap out of it is to talk really loud and be energetic.”
Across her 20 games, Garner saw the team through many of its victories over its 13-10 finish last season. One of her favorite memories was the team’s 3-1 victory over Princeton, which was the team’s first triumph over the Tigers since 2015 at the time.
“It was my first collegiate league game and we were not expected to win, so going out there and just playing hard and winning and upsetting them in their own home gym was a highlight,” Garner said.
This season, Garner has been playing particularly well. One stand out performance was against Columbia, where she had a hitting percentage of 0.455, with 11 kills, one of her most efficient games till now.
“This year to come in and really get some great kills for us, and get some big swings and do some great things offensively; that’s been a big jump in her game this season,” Hagstrom said.
Looking to the future, Garner is focused on honing her strengths on the court even further, such as working on her blocking and attacking.
“I think she’s a good leader, she’s a hard worker, and so that’s something that maybe she can step into,” Hagstrom said. “As a sixth row outside, she’s just got to stay sharp in all aspects of her game … every practice, she’s got to just maintain that, that high level of play that we need from her.”
