Sacramento State alumnus of 1993 and Hornet volleyball head coach Ruben Volta is this semester’s winner of The State Hornet’s Best Coach award.

His team made it to the Big Sky Tournament this year after not making it the past two seasons.

The Hornets have an overall record of 17-15 and a conference record of 10-6 this season. The team’s home record was 7-5 and their away record was 10-10. The longest losing streak consisted of two straight games.

The team took third place in the Big Sky Conference, which got them an invitation to the Big Sky Tournament in Portland, Ore., where they placed fourth.

Volta graduated from Sac State with a degree in physical education after playing four years on the Sac State Men’s Volleyball Club team.

In 1995, Volta opened the High Voltage volleyball facility and club in Sacramento, where he remained a coach there for seven years.

He began coaching in 1992 as the Grant High School men and women’s head volleyball coach. Volta then went to Country Day High School in Sacramento where he coached two seasons. He was then the assistant coach for the Rio Americano High School team and went on to coaching the Davis 18-under club team for a season before coming to Sac State.

Senior middle blocker Kelsey Elston played for Volta on the 18-under Gold Cal Junior Club that went to the Junior Olympics where they placed fifth in the American division.

When Volta was told he won best coach he said it was really an attribute to his players because they are the ones who went out and performed and had a good season.

He said he thought a large part to this season’s success was due to the senior leadership on the team.

 “We had five seniors that contributed a lot and were on the court a lot, so they have been here the last couple years,” Volta said. “They had a lot of confidence in themselves, watching them progress over the last couple years.”

Volta said this season the team worked on aspects that needed to be improved on and in areas of the game they saw as important.

“It really comes down to the players. They just had a different level of confidence, they had big goals to win the conference tournament and we had a good season,” Volta said. “It was really nice for our seniors.”

“There will be a lot of freshmen so there will possibly be more teaching of different things that we just got to fine tune with the seniors,” Volta said. “But now we will break down with some freshmen and get them prepared to play the game at our level.”

Outside hitter Eyrn Kirby’s parents have seen Volta coach their daughter and the evolving Hornet volleyball team for the past four years.

“Ruben has earned the respect and focus of his players and they all want to succeed as a team,” Eryn’s father Al Kirby said. “There is no doubt that Coach Volta will have a successful future at Sac State.”

Al Kirby is not the only person who finds Volta to be a good coach.

“Ruben also does a good job motivating the team,” Hornet setter Anna Schoener said. “He knows how to get us into a competitive spirit at practice, which then shows up in games.”

Nicole Bee can be reached at [email protected].