Winning a state championship in any sport is hard. Trying to win consecutive state titles can be, well, twice as hard. That’s what head coach Meredith Forkum found out this season with her Middleburg High School volleyball squad.
After leading the Broncos to their first ever state championship last year with a 27-5 record, Forkum knew her team would have the proverbial bull’s-eye on its back in 2024.
Forkum still led her team to a 22-5 record this year while winning their district in the process. The Broncos swept the Leon Lions in the first round of the regionals tournament and advanced to the next round to face the Beachside Barracudas.
“We won the first set, but after that things kind of unraveled for us,” Forkum said.
The Broncos fell to the Barracudas, bringing an end to the season and hopes of a second straight state title.
It didn’t help that one of Middleburg’s top players came down with some sort of a stomach bug the day before the match with Beachside. It was coach Forkum’s daughter, Brooke, who is one of the team’s key outside hitters.
“It hit her hard, whatever it was she had,” Forkum said of her daughter’s illness.
Even a last-minute IV session did not help a whole lot, leaving one of the team’s top players struggling the morning of the deciding set.
“She was able to play, but she was not even close to being 100%,” Forkum said of her daughter.
Despite falling short this year, Forkum said she likes where the program is currently at and the direction it is heading in moving forward.
“Coach Carri Pruitt developed quite the winning program here over her 38 years, leading us to numerous Final Fours, and then we were very fortunate to pull it all together (in 2023) and win a state title,” Forkum said.
The head coach said she wants to develop a program that continues to stay in the hunt.
“We want to carry on that tradition of competing for state championships every season,” she said.
So, how exactly does Forkum plan to do that?
“Discipline is a big part of any successful program, but I also believe in team unity,” she said. “I like our girls doing things together on and away from the floor.”
Of course, you have to have good players, and you must replace good players.
“We will lose three solid players who have meant a lot to this program,” Forkum said.
Those three are Brooke Forkum, who will continue her volleyball career at Troy University; Olivia Callipo, a setter who will attend Upstate College in South Carolina; and Morgan Padgett, the team’s libero. Padgett will not be playing volleyball collegiately, opting instead to become a firefighter.
Despite losing those solid players who were key to the team’s success these past two seasons, Forkum will return some top talent to the Broncos’ 2025 roster.
“We’ll return junior Camden Rahn, one of our outside hitters, and senior Kate Lowery, who was a middle hitter last season but will move to outside next season,” Forkum said. “They are both impact players. We’ll be counting on them for sure.”
Rahn is already committed to West Virginia.
Forkum said other than having talent, there’s not a big secret to maintaining a championship culture within the Middleburg volleyball program.
“Good players and great people is what wins championships, and that’s what we want here,” she said.
That sounds like a winning formula.
