Yorkville Setter/Right Side Rebecca Nauman Stands Out

Yorkville junior setter/right side Rebecca Nauman is versatile player and a great leader for the Lady Foxes varsity volleyball team.

The three-year varsity starter is the floor captain of this year’s team that started the season 13-0, which was a first for the Lady Foxes. The previous best start was 5-0 in 1997. Yorkville is 14-4 and 1-4 in the Northern Illinois Big 12 East Division.

Last week, Nauman had 10 assists, two aces, and one block in a match at DeKalb on Sept. 22. DeKalb won 25-19, 25-20. On Sept. 20, the Foxes beat Morris in three games (25-23, 21-25, 25-17) for their first conference victory and Nauman nailed down 11 kills, dished out five assists and collected three aces. For these efforts, Nauman is being named Athlete of the Week.

For the season, the 16-year-old Yorkville resident has amassed 102 assists, 97 kills, 57 digs, 24 aces and nine blocks.

Nauman comes from a family of five. Her parents are father, Joe, who graduated from Amboy, and mother Jeanie, who went to Providence. She has a younger brother Joey, 13, who is in eighth grade and participates in football, wrestling and track; and a younger sister Julie, 10, a fifth-grader who loves to swim and loves horses. Joe played football and basketball for the Clippers.

During its 13-game winning streak, Yorkville won two tournaments — Rockford East invite and the Yorkville Invite — both were firsts for the program. 

Coach Mike Dunn says Nauman is “one of our faces of our program. She is extremely hardworking and a very smart player. She has played all positions. She has done a great job and has done everything we have asked her to do. Her leadership is excellent, it’s second to none. She does a great job, basically, being the quarterback of our team. She carries us on our back and does a great job with that. I feel comfortable that she communicates with everybody else on the team what I want to get across.”

When did you start playing volleyball and taking the sport seriously? (In) sixth grade, I started club. I did a few camps before then, but that wasn’t competitive. In sixth grade, is when I started competitively playing. Actually two of my good friends and I, decided we wanted to try volleyball. We found a club (Sports Performance in North Aurora also known as Spri), one of the best club’s around here, so we just stuck with that. (She has played club ball for five years).

Do you play any other sports competitively? No, not any more. I used to play softball until high school. I pitched, played third base and a little outfield and that was until eighth grade.

Do you have college plans? Not yet, just looking at different schools and visiting. I have visited the University of Indianapolis. I visited Austin Peay in Tennessee and Belmont University in Tennessee.

Do you want to play volleyball in college? Yes.

Do you have a leadership role with the team? Yes, I am the floor captain.

What is it like being the floor captain of the team? What are the responsibilities? It is exciting and it is also more of a role. So, you have to take that on and help everyone out. Not only figure out what you did wrong, but the court as a whole. Basically, just encouraging everyone, making sure everyone is on top of their game, helping each other and keeping everyone positive.

Would you describe the team having a family atmosphere and how do you foster it? Yes, very much so. We just stay connected. We are all very good friends outside of volleyball, too. We hang out, (go to) sleepovers. This is the group of friends we want to be with. It makes it a lot more fun.

Do you have a favorite volleyball player or players, role model(s)? I love beach volleyball, watching the Olympics and stuff — Misty May and Kerri Walsh.

I would say my parents are my role models, because they are just always there for me. They always try to help me and make me better. They always support me.

Yorkville got off to its best start ever, how special was it for you and the team? It was very exciting and an honor to be a part of that. We just hope we can continue.  (For the team) I think it was exciting, but it was also, like, pressure, because it was such a big deal. Everyone started to hear about us and that added a little bit more pressure when we started conference play. We didn’t want (the winning streak) to stop.

What are your expectations for the rest of the season? I hope we play every game like it was our last and push every point. Of course we want to win, but we want to make sure we are getting better every game and every practice. It has been an exciting season so far and I hope it continues.