Bronco travels abroad to play with the Swiss

By Margo Consul

A former Bronco athlete traded sunny Santa Clara for snowy Switzerland to play her sport at an international level. The Santa Clara caught up with Bronco volleyball player Crystal Matich '07 to ask her about her experiences.

As a senior, Matich was named a 2007 American Volleyball Coaches Association All-American honorable mention, earned AVCA All-Pacific Region honors, West Coast Conference Player of the Year and was a WCC First Team all-conference honoree. Matich finished her final season with the Broncos with 1,453 assists, 33 service aces and a .331 hitting percentage. She finished her Santa Clara career ranked third on the school's all-time assist average list, fourth in career assists and seventh on the all-time service aces list.

The Santa Clara: How did you find out about overseas play? Did you get recruited or did you seek them out?

Crystal Matich: After you play college volleyball at a high level, there are only a few paths you can take. You can play beach, which costs a lot of money, and it's tough to make it to the Association of Volleyball Professionals. You've got to be a pretty good player. Or you can play overseas.

I didn't want to go back to school right after I graduated to get my teaching credential. I wanted to keep playing until I hated it or my body gave out because I still love the game.

I signed up for this professional volleyball agency called Bring It Promotions. I got an agent and he put up a little profile with video links and sent out my video to teams. The team in Switzerland picked my video. They said they don't know because it's hard to tell from a video, so they flew me out and I tried out in Italy for the team. They were going to a tournament in Italy. I guess they liked what they saw and I got to play with them for nine more months.

It was totally random, that whole sports overseas for women thing, but it's getting bigger.

We only traveled to Italy in the very beginning for an open tournament, which was really cool, but because we were in League B, we were the top team in League B, and we were fighting to move up to League A, which we did. We accomplished our goal. We beat all the teams in League B and moved up to League A.

If I play next year, we will play the top teams in Switzerland. But the top teams of the country, like the top two, they play in sort of a European Cup tournament, and that's when they get to travel to different countries.

That is the highest level of play, and that's where the national players play, on those top, top teams. It's pretty competitive.

TSC: Were you the only American player on the team?

CM: For the first four or five months, I was the only American player, and then the next half I talked to my coaches and explained to them how in order for us to move up we needed a strong attacker because I was the only setter.

We got a middle blocker from Wisconsin for the last three months, so there were just two of us on the team.

TSC: Is it a lot like Division I athletics, or not at all?

CM: It's more team-oriented when you are in college. It's all about getting along with your teammates and making sure everyone is on the same page and that everyone is happy and playing well.

Playing-overseas is more individually based, where each player can sort of be their own player and get the job done and no one has to be friends. It's kind of not as fun in the aspect of good team bonding and stuff like that. It's just a different fun.

In Santa Clara, it was like a family and everyone was friends. It was great getting out there and practicing with everyone. Then playing overseas was the experience of traveling around Europe, getting to learn different languages, just different volleyball.

TSC: Did you ski on the Alps at all?

CM: I was not able to ski during my time there because the president of my club did not want me to get hurt during season. So instead I went sledding a lot and snow-shoeing.

TSC: How did Santa Clara prepare you for this experience?

CM: I came in out of high school not a very well-rounded player, but I had the athletic ability and (Santa Clara volleyball head coach) Jon Wallace looked at me and said "You're athletic alright, we'll put you on our team."

He basically trained me for four years as a setter and as a strong-minded person. It's tough to get through to girls. Some are stubborn, some don't listen, some cry, which makes it tough as a male coach.

Our coaching staff did a good job at getting through to us as players, as students, as friends, and they molded us into well-rounded athletes.

Even though I wasn't going over there to be a student obviously, practices weren't as intense. Maybe it was the level I was at, but I was so prepared that I became the leader on the court, pushing my teammates on the court and telling them that this is what I expected of them.

It's just tough to be all alone overseas without your family. That was just something that no coach or any person can prepare you for.

TSC: Will you go back?

CM: My club offered me a new contract, more money, more bonuses, more everything. But I think I want to try as many new countries as I can because I didn't get to travel as much with my team. I got to travel quite a bit on my own. I think if I get to a higher level, I'll get to travel.

I'm hoping Spain, the warmer places, let's say Greece. I keep telling myself that. I hope to get a team that travels a bit more and is at a little bit higher level.

TSC: Are the Olympics your end goal?

CM: Yeah. I hope that our national team will look at me and look at my skills. That is every girl's dream, that's what you are striving for obviously, but it's tough because our U.S. National Team already has their team set because their setter and their players are a little bit older and they have been around for longer.

But once they start flushing in new players -- younger players -- that might be a good opportunity for me with my playing overseas to be looking at that a little bit more. That is always a goal of mine, to play in the Olympics.

TSC: What were your favorite memories either on or off the court while you were living overseas?

CM: How random: All my friends from Santa Clara, not all, but my close friends from Santa Clara, were in Switzerland with me. Going to a town over, visiting Jac Heler '04, who graduated when I was a freshman, and is still playing overseas in Switzerland.

Visiting Brody Angley '08 in Lugano, Switzerland. He played over there, and we had dinner with his teammates and I saw his little apartment. His town was close to the Italian border, so it had a cute Italian feel, which I love.

When Anna (Cmaylo) came, she played for a team 40 minutes away from me. That was fun, going and playing against her -- we had to scrimmage her team. That was weird seeing her on the other side of the net and being competitive with someone who I have known since we were 15, so that was just crazy in itself.

Mitch Henke '08 came over and lived with me for two or three weeks while he was looking for a team, and he got picked up by a team in Luxembourg and is still playing over there. It was nice having so many people I knew close by.

Contact Margo Consul at (408) 551-1918 or mconsul@scu.edu.