Mike Roberts Director, Coach 18 National, Assistant Coach 17 National

    Mike graduated from Great Bridge High School, but only attended his Senior Year there. Before moving to Virginia, he lived in Rota, Spain where he started his volleyball play and was selected as a member of the All-Spain Team, playing OH and MB. Mike continued his playing with beach volleyball during the off seasons. Other activities included football, soccer, baseball and basketball.

        Both Mike and Kristen Roberts (proud parents of Kameron Isabelle born 7/13/2006) were the head coach at Tallwood High School from 2005 - 2008 and coached the Beach Girlz 17’s team during the 2005-2006 JO’s season. Mike is CAP II certified.

    Mike coached 16 National in 2007 and 18 National in 2008 and 2009.

     

     Cheryl Smith Director, Coach 15 National, Assistant Coach 12 National
         Cheryl has been coaching young athletes for more than 20 years.  She began as a competitive swimmer in ODAC and continued her athletic career at JMU as an intercollegiate swimmer and volleyball player.  She graduated with a Bachelors in Physical Education, a Minor in Coaching and a Masters Degree in Education.  After college, Cheryl coached swim teams in the Chesapeake/Great Bridge area for 10 years.  She coached middle school volleyball at Great Bridge and Junior Olympic Volleyball at TVA, first with 13s, and then with 15s.  Five of her teams placed first in the Old Dominion Region and qualified for Nationals.  Currently, she is a Physical Education teacher in Chesapeake and has coached the girl's Volleyball team at Landstown High School for 5 seasons, placing in the VHSL AAA State Tournament "Final Four" and named the Eastern Region Co-Coach of the Year in 2008.  Cheryl is CAP I certified.

    Cheryl has coached 15 National for the last 3 seasons.

    Randy West  Director, Coach 13 National

        Randy West is the head volleyball coach at Norfolk Christian High School and Landstown Middle School. He hails from Lincoln, Nebraska and is a 30 year Navy veteran. Coach West holds a Bachelor degree in Psychology from Saint Leo University as well as a Masters in Secondary Education from Old Dominion University. He has played competitive volleyball for over 20 years and is a National Federation of High Schools (NFHS) and Virginia High School League (VHSL) certified volleyball official.  He coached the Pre-Teen (10-12) and Junior (13-14) girls programs for four seasons with the Virginia Beach Parks and Recreation’s Courthouse Association volleyball program. Coach West is certified through the American Sports Education Program (ASEP) and is a member of the Virginia Beach Coaches Association.

    Randy coached the 15 Regional team in the 2007 season, the 14 National team in 2008 and the 13 National Team in 2009.

    Tonya Boser Coach 14 National

    Tonya began playing volleyball, softball and swimming in 6th grade.  In high school Tonya  pursued swimming where she was the MVP and team captain her senior year and went on to swim for a short time in college.  During high school she also continued to play volleyball with the junior volleyball organization NEI, where she lead her team as the setter/team captain to win the mid-west championships four years in a row.  Following one year of successfully wasting her parent's money in college, Tonya joined the Navy and after six years, she separated from active duty to join the reserves. Eventually she moved to Minnesota to attend the University of Minnesota for Kinesiology (doing much better this time around).  She hopes to continue her education and plans to apply for her Master's in Physical Education at ODU.  Tonya's husband, Chad, is a Surface Warfare Officer in the Navy and they have two daughter's, Drew and Marti.

    Tonya has been coaching girls volleyball since 2001, including coaching VBVBA 12N in 2008 and VBVBA 14N in 2009.

    George Dyson Coach 13 Regional

    Whitney Dyson Assistant Coach 13 Regional

    Susie Fleenor Coach 12 Regional

    Susie Fleenor is the middle school coach at Norfolk Academy.  Growing up in Miami, Florida, she played softball as soon as her big brother could get a glove on her hand, added basketball in elementary school but didn’t start playing volleyball until seventh grade.  She went to Furman University in South Carolina where she played volleyball all four years and softball for two.  Susie holds a Bachelors degree in Elementary Physical Education and a Masters in Athletic Administration from ODU.  She taught elementary PE and coached Varsity volleyball and softball at Norfolk Academy.  Wanting to stay home with her children, she stopped teaching full time but continued coaching volleyball when her second child was born in 1996.  She now coaches the middle school team and teaches preschool at Parish Day School.  Susie is Impact certified and is also an official with Eastern Virginia Officials Association.

    Susie has been married to Rob for 18 years and is the proud mom of Kristi and Ben.

    Susie co-coached the 15 Regional team in 2009.

    Martin French Coach 12 Regional

    Martin French graduated from Parkersburg High School in West Virginia where he played varsity soccer and basketball.  After graduating with a B.A. in Political Science from The Ohio State University, he received his commission as a naval officer and went off to flight school in Pensacola, Florida, where he began his obsession with volleyball and trained to fly navy aircraft in between volleyball matches.  During his naval career he had the opportunity to attend San Diego State University and Old Dominion University, receiving his M.B.A in 2008.  He also played for Navy volleyball teams in San Diego and in the Tidewater Area.  Martin retired from the Navy in July 2009 and currently works for the Navy as a Test and Evaluation Senior Analyst for Command, Control and Computer Systems in Norfolk.  He has coached Rec volleyball for the past 3 years, and continues to play competitive volleyball indoors and on the beach (at a much slower pace than 15 years ago, but with as much enthusiasm).

    Manuel Godino Assistant Coach 15 National

    Manuel has been playing volleyball for 7 years. He has been playing soccer his entire life, but did not begin playing volleyball until his freshman year in high school. Manuel played volleyball, all 4 years, for Landstown high school as a DS/Libero and setter, as well as soccer for the varsity team.

    He graduated from Landstown high school as an honor student with an advanced diploma.  After graduating in 2007, he pursued a higher education in mechanical engineering at Virginia Commonwealth University and continued playing volleyball and soccer for intramural teams. After his first semester at VCU, Manuel transferred to Tidewater Community College and is still pursuing a mechanical engineering career.

    During his spare time, Manuel likes to play soccer, basketball, volleyball and chess.  He would also like to some day go to outer space.

    Britt Johnson Coach 14 Regional

    Melanie McCaleb Assistant Coach 14 Regional

    Michelle McGovern Coach 12 National

    Michelle grew up in Virginia Beach where she attended First Colonial High School and played basketball, volleyball as a setter and softball as a 1st baseman. In college, she played volleyball and softball as a walk-on in at UVA at Wise. After a year, she transferred to Coastal Carolina University where she majored in Marine Science, minored in Biology and received her Master's in Secondary Science Education. Michelle is currently a Biology/Earth Science teacher at Kellam where she is the Boys' Volleyball assistant coach. She's also the Virginia Beach Middle School Girls' head coach. Michelle is very active with sports, playing co-ed softball and volleyball year-round at TVA.

    Michelle coached the 12 National team in 2009.

    Bev Nuckles Coach 15 Regional

    Bev has been coaching for 26 years altogether. She started at TVA and coached ages 13 - 16 for 10 years. She also coached varsity Boys and Girls at the High School Level. Currently she is the JJV volleyball coach at NSA, where her current focus on form and fundamentals in the beginning is one of the reasons why she feels NSA has strong varsity teams. She also conducts camps for JJV and JV players during the summer. Bev plays and refs volleyball which she feels really helps one understand the game. Bev is CAP I certified.

    Erin Paton  Assistant Coach 13 National

     

    Erin played high school volleyball at Western Branch HS, in Chesapeake, Virginia.  She now attends and plays volleyball for Virginia Wesleyan University.  Erin has played JO volleyball for VBVBA and is now assuming the assistant coaching position of VBVBA 13N TNT from Coach George.  Erin brings a tremendous knowledge of the game, especially on the defensive side.  She is considered to be one of the best Libero's from this area.

    Erin was the Assistant Coach of 12 National in 2009.

     

    Leslie Peacock Assistant Coach 16 National

    Leslie has been playing volleyball for thirteen years. She played seven seasons of Junior Olympic volleyball as well as varsity for Landstown as their setter all four years of her high school career. Leslie also attended the Sports Performance’s Setting Academy coached by Rick Butler in Chicago during the summers of 2005 and 2006.  

    Leslie graduated from Landstown in the top ten percent of her class with a GPA of 3.9 in 2008. Leslie decided to attend Old Dominion University in Norfolk and is currently a junior with a double major in psychology and nursing. 

    Kristen Roberts Recruiting, Board Member

    Kristen attended Amelia County High School where she played varsity volleyball and was a standout player in softball as a pitcher. Upon graduating she moved to the Tidewater Area and began the pursuit of degree in Education. She graduated from Old Dominion University with a Master’s in Education. She has been teaching at Tallwood High School for 4 years. Aside from coaching volleyball, Kristen has also been the JV Softball coach for 3 years. 

    This is Kristen's fourth year with the club.

    Nicole Shoup Assistant Coach 14 National

    While Nicole was a two year starter at Chowan, she was ranked number one in all NCAA division II schools for services aces per set. (136 aces out of 126 games). She was the first athlete to get athlete recognition from NCAA (2007), ICAA libero of the year (2007), ICAA all-rookie team selection (2007), ICAA first team selection (2007), and Big South Region second team. She also set school record for digs and aces during season where it still stands (2007), was on the Janet Collins All-Tournament team (2007) and the Chowan University Invitational All-Tournament Team (2007). For high school, Nicole was on the All-Tidewater Second team and All Beach District second team. Though she was a setter in club ball, she was a libero in high school and college. Nicole also coaches Courthouse Recreation volleyball. She also has helped out in a few volleyball camps and participated in Woman's Sports Day at Chowan University. She is attending Old Dominion University and hopes to become a teacher.

    Sydney Simerson  Practice Coach

    Sydney graduated from Ocean Lakes High School in 2008, where she played volleyball for all four years, and is currently attending Old Dominion University.  She is majoring in English and would like to be a sports journalist or an English professor once she graduates.  Sydney has been playing Junior Olympics since she was 12 years old, and played for VBVBA 18G's her very last season.  Sydney has also been refereeing and assistant coaching for many years, and is excited to join the VBVBA coaching staff.

    Chris Smith Web Admin

    Chris has been actively watching his wife's (Cheryl) and kids' (Patrick, Megan and Kelly) junior volleyball games for over 10 years.  He has consistently placed in the top 12 in the Folding Court Chair competition and is ranked in the third quartile in the Run-real-quick-and-get-me-a-bottled-water-before-the-next-match event.  As he has no coaching experience, he was given the task of creating and updating the web site so no player would ever have to learn the infamous Smith "Chicken Wing".  Smith graduated from Virginia Tech where he quickly put his Biology degree to work as a restaurant manager.  Continuing with his rich zoology tradition, he is currently a network engineer for a Navy contractor. Chris has several certifications, but as they are all computer related, they're really too geeky to be mentioned on a volleyball site.

    This is Chris' fourth year with the club.

     

    Rachel Thomas Coach 16 National

    Rachel played Right Side and Outside hitter at the US Naval Academy. She was 1 of 5 players in the history of the USNA D1 volleyball program to amass more than 1000 career kills.  She also ranks 2nd in service aces, 4th in blocking, received All American Academic honors and selected Patriot League Scholar-Athlete of the year in 2007.  Rachel actively coached at the Naval Academy’s summer volleyball camps as well as helped organize and run various other camps/clinics.  She is currently the JV coach for Bishop Sullivan Catholic HS and in the Navy.  She is married and her husband serves on the USS WASP.

    Pat Troia Coach 16 Regional

    Pat Troia has 20 years of coaching experience, from 11 years of Basketball (4 years as the Head Varsity Coach at Hickory High School) to 15 years of Track and Field (11 years as the Head Varsity Coach for Hickory). At Hickory, his athletes have seen great success, with numerous players receiving All-State, All-Region and All-District accolades and over 40 that have played collegiately. He also has 6 years of Rec Volleyball coaching experience in Virginia Beach.

    Pat received his B.S. in Physical Education from Eastern Michigan University and his M.S. in Physical Education (with emphasis in Sports Management) from ODU.  He just started his 20th year as a teacher, the last 13 at Hickory High School.

    Pat is married to his wonderful wife of 20 years, Terri.  They have 3 daughters: Bailey, Carlyn and Riley.

    Pat coached 12 Regional and co-coached 16 National in 2009.

    Dee Dee West Bookkeeper

    John Winfield Coach 17 National, Assistant Coach 18 National

    John Winfield had the honor to coach VBVBA's 2009 14 regional team and then finished the season co-coaching the 16 National team with Pat Troia. John Winfield was also the assistant coach for Landstown High school for the 09 season were he enjoyed sharing the bench and learning more about the game from the legendary Coach Cheryl Smith. John Winfield is a USAV IMPACT and Cap Level I certified coach and is currently coaching the 17s National Team for the 2010 season. He is a 20 year Navy Veteran retiree who really enjoys spending time with his wife Debora and his two daughters Samantha and Sydney, who are currently playing Volleyball on VBVBA's 14N and 13R respectfully. Coach John's ideal day would be to hit the surf in a dawn patrol session with his daughters... then play Beach Volleyball until dark then finish the day by spending that evening talking about the day with his family after dinner at Starbucks. The coach he would most like to meet and emulate would be the great Coach John Woodend.