Preseason workouts have become common for many CHS teams. In recent years, preseason workouts have been starting earlier than ever before. Specifically this year, baseball began preseason workouts early in first semester and football began training for the 2015-2016 school year in January of this year.

In past years, the volleyball team has always started preseason training in June. This is a common trend of fall sports at CHS such as soccer, cross-country, and football. The earlier coaches can get their players conditioning, the better the overall result has been.

With school volleyball, participants like sophomore Morgan Seaman are also participating in club volleyball outside of school. This means back-to-back practices; one right after school with the CHS team and then one at their club. CHS practices last an hour and a half, and club practices last about two and a half hours.

According to Seaman, she said she enjoys having both practices because she can see her friends from  both CHS and club volleyball all in one night.

In addition, the women’s volleyball team got a new coach, Matt Fishman, in early April, who previously coached at IU.

“I like our new coach because he is nice and knows a lot about the game from previously coaching at IU, but it is different having preseason practices early,” Seaman said.

According to Fishman via email, he said he believes that the team started0 preseason practices too late in the past.

“I would say that we are actually a little late in regards to starting an open gym program for the spring,” Fishman said.

Seaman said she is not used to having preseason practices so early; however, it is a change that she said she enjoys.

“We are doing a lot of new drills that are really competitive and focus on playing fast and working as a team,” Seaman said.

Fishman also said the open gyms mainly consist of large group skill training with the focus of connecting two or more actions. Players mainly participate in wash drills and scrimmage scenarios.

According to Fishman, his final day of coaching at IU was May 1, and he is very excited to be continuing his coaching career at CHS.

“As an ‘05 alum, I’m excited to be back home. I now have a very humbling opportunity to give back to a school and community that gave me so much,” Fishman said. “In addition to being a charter member of the men’s program, I’m looking forward to continuing the tradition that these girls have set. The standards of the program is something that I am very protective of and will continue to meet and/or raise the current bench mark.”

Women’s volleyball won the state championship this school year and according to Fishman, he does not need to change the way the women are playing because they know what the state title is and means.

According to Fishman, he has put pressure on those who will be seniors next year.

“I’ve put a lot of responsibility on the current junior players to design and run the open gyms. It has allowed me the opportunity to see their leadership skills while also allowing me to evaluate the entire group,” Fishman said.

According to Seaman, even though some key players were lost because they graduated, there are players ready to step in to take those roles.

“Everyone is expecting us to not be very good this coming year, which is why they are going to be shocked when they find out how good our program really is,” Seaman said.

In addition, Fishman said that the skill level at CHS is good and little needs to be done in terms of how the players play the game.

“I can say that my style of coaching is fast pace. So you can expect to see our speed increase in all phases of the game,” Fishman said.

When high school teams receive a new coach, there is often a great amount of expectancy that is expected from the student body especially with a school as large as CHS.

According to Fishman, he is ready for what the season holds and he knows what it means to be coaching at CHS.

“The talent of this program is deep and we have some really athletic incoming freshman that will make tryouts in August very interesting,” Fishman said. “So my main focus right now is solidifying a knowledgeable and highly capable staff that can get the most out of every individual.”