Middle Tennessee State University Athletics
“Whenever I put the shirt on, I had no idea what to expect” - Jansen finds success in new role at libero
10/11/2024 3:01:00 PM | Women's Volleyball
The Dutch outside hitter has stepped up in the back row for MTSU Volleyball
MURFREESBORO, Tenn. — When you click on outside hitter Laure Jansen's player profile on GoBlueRaiders.com, the Middle Tennessee volleyball player doesn't quite have the stat lines game by game you'd imagine for the 5-foot-11, six-rotation player from the Netherlands.
Sure, it starts pretty typical for an All-Conference USA hitter. Three straight matches across two different weeks with double-digit kill totals at the start of the season, some strong usage numbers overall make it clear she's always on the court. But get to Utah Tech, MTSU's first game of week three of the 2024 season, and Jansen's numbers don't look like the numbers of an outside hitter.
Zero kills, three assists and 28 digs against Utah Tech. Zero kills, three service aces and 24 digs against College of Charleston. Zero kills, two assists, four aces and 21 digs at Virginia. By the time Conference USA play starts, Jansen barely gets any kills at all, instead setting the program record for digs in a set with 9.75, tying a program record by digging 39 balls in a four-set loss to Sam Houston State.
Head Coach Chuck Crawford wanted to make a change to spark his team after a slow start to the season. But moving an all-CUSA hitter to the libero jersey, which Jansen has donned since week three, was a drastic change.
"We knew Laure was a great passer and defender," Crawford explained. "We threw her in there and all of a sudden she's digging seven balls a set."
With a young roster in 2024, the senior Jansen offered Middle Tennessee volleyball stability in the back row, the ultimate goal of Crawford when he gave Jansen the nod to play libero, a defensive specialist position that's only allowed to play on the back row of rotations, typically playing nearly every minute a middle hitter spends on the back row in most substitution schemes.
Signified by wearing a different color jersey than their teammates, Jansen had limited experience in the libero role, playing it briefly her first spring in Murfreesboro after transferring from Arkansas Little Rock due to MTSU carrying a smaller roster that semester. But she was willing to do anything to help the team win.
"We have a very young team," Jansen said. "I feel like, especially when people are going into the shirt, it's more pressure. They wanted to create more peace."
A strong passer, Jansen was able to stick as a six-rotation player because she could handle the pressure of getting under a rocket from an opposing hitter and delivering a playable ball to her setter in the process. That's something that could easily translate to the libero role. In addition, her height gave her extra range on the back row, helping her control more of the floor.
"She takes away space and she gets to balls that our smaller kids can't get to," Crawford said. "Laure, a lot of times, doesn't dive on the floor a whole lot because she doesn't need to. She reads (hitters) so well, she probably knew what that hitter had for breakfast this morning."
But both Crawford and Jansen could not have anticipated how well the transition has gone so far. When a good libero averages about 4.5 digs per set, Jansen has burst past those numbers in Conference USA play, averaging 5.48 digs per set through six games, top in the conference during CUSA play by nearly 0.7 digs per set. The record-setting performance at Sam Houston led her to being named CUSA Defensive Player of the Week on September 30.
"Whenever I put the shirt on, I had no idea what to expect, Jansen said. "Getting all these achievements is insane, I've never expected that. It definitely gives me more motivation to just keep going with what I'm doing.
"But I need to watch out that I'm not putting too much pressure on myself, that I need to have those amounts of digs per set, because you're going to focus on the wrong things."
To be sure, the Blue Raiders miss Jansen's offensive production when she's in the shirt, though Crawford is high on Aowyn Schrader, who's taken over at outside hitter for Jansen. The 6-foot-2 freshman with "a heavy arm" that just came back from injury, Crawford said, has had five double-digit kills games since Jansen took over at libero.
Does Jansen miss getting the chance to hit at her natural position? Of course, Jansen said. But she's excited about the new niche she's found.
"I really like playing defense," Jansen said. "You just shut your brain off, you just don't think and you just go. Whenever you play defense, you just try to read the game as much as you can and go for every single ball. That's such a mentality I love, don't overthink... My technique might not be the prettiest, but if the ball goes to target, that's the only thing that matters."
