Volleyball
Favorite athlete: Kerri Walsh
Favorite team: Penn State
Favorite memory competing in sports: Winning first round of playoffs my senior year against Conestoga.
Most embarrassing/funniest thing that has happened while competing in sports: When Maddie Mauri got hit in the face during a game, and it was a perfect pass.
Music on mobile device: Country
Future plans: Play volleyball at Thomas Jefferson University and pursue a major in Pharmacy.
Words to live by: “The only person you should try to be better than is the person you were yesterday.”
One goal before turning 30: Visit Europe
One thing people don’t know about me: My dog is bigger than me.
By Ed Morrone
For Lizzie Shirley, call her indoctrination into the sport of volleyball a happy accident. Or, better yet, a blind leap of faith that has paid major dividends.
Like many kids growing up, Shirley started on the mainstream path, with soccer and softball being her top two sports. Then, when she was in fifth grade, the Central Bucks South senior sat down with her dad to peruse other athletic options at the CYO level. They randomly chose volleyball.
Shirley decided she would give it a shot. Why not?
“I thought it might be fun to try it, and I fell in love with it right away,” she said. “After the first practice, I knew it was the sport for me. I loved the team aspect. Volleyball is all about teamwork. You can’t do it all yourself and you rely on your teammates so much. That’s what made me stick with it, and here I am now.”
Given her position of setter, it’s no surprise to hear Shirley gush about the collective effort it takes to have success on the volleyball court. In volleyball, the setter serves as both the team communicator and facilitator. It was Shirley’s job to make sure her teammates were correctly lined up and knew the play that would be run on offense. Additionally, she held the responsibility of determining which hitter would get the ball based off the position of the pass to give teammates the best opportunity for a kill at the net.
Like a quarterback or point guard, the team’s offense ran primarily through Shirley, and unless a game was a blowout, she never came off the court in her final three seasons as the Titans’ starting setter.
“As a setter, my main job is to set hitters up for a kill,” Shirley said. “All I want to do is give our hitters the chance to put the ball away. Get those points that will help us win the game. The position fits my personality in that I want what’s best for everybody and the team as a whole. I want them to have the spotlight, and I can just be in the background.”
By definition, a volleyball setter may sacrifice the glory of stuffing the stat sheet with kills, but at the same time, Shirley was far from just a shadow in the background of CB South’s successes as a team. In her four years with the program, the Titans never had a losing record, and the team was even more accomplished the last two seasons, when Shirley not-so-coincidentally served as a team captain. In her junior and senior campaigns, Shirley helped lead the team to a 35-13 overall record, which included identical 13-5 marks in the SOL National Conference.
In Shirley’s senior season that recently concluded, the Titans won their district playoff opener against Conestoga before falling to Hatboro-Horsham in the second round. For her career, Shirley racked up 1,846 assists (more than 1,000 this past season alone), 453 digs and 140 service aces.
Kurt Godfrey became the head girls volleyball coach at CB South five years ago, one year before Shirley got to high school. In addition to his four years of coaching her at South, Godfrey is also Shirley’s club coach with East Coast Power, which just began its season on Monday, making it the eighth season Godfrey has coached Shirley in the past four years. The two have developed a strong connection, so much so that they can communicate to each other with glances instead of words.
“Our program is infinitely better because of Lizzie and the things she accomplished on the court,” Godfrey said. “She’s the first kid since I’ve been the head coach that was elected captain as a junior. She’s always been a student of the game, and her volleyball IQ is strong. Not only does she fully understand our offense, but she also understands everything that goes on on the other side of the net. She reads the other side and knows what teams will throw at us, which helps our defense and blocking schemes.
“As a captain, she is incredibly encouraging to her teammates. Everybody feels comfortable in going to her, and she keeps the team together in that sense. It’s her job to build a family culture, and Lizzie is a shining example of what a captain should be.”
Shirley takes immense pride in how that family dynamic coalesced for the Titans, more so than any win the team had. She mentioned multiple times how much she loved her teammates, who she referred to as her best friends, and the best part about the playoff win over Conestoga was not the win itself, but rather that it ensured Shirley another week of practice and another game with her team. Conversely, the defeat that ended South’s season was “one of the most crushing feelings I’ve ever had.”
“It’s really hard now that it’s over, because I don’t get to have that anymore,” Shirley said. “Being with those girls every day was my favorite part of everything in my life. Without them, I wouldn’t be the same person I am today.”
The same goes for Godfrey, who Shirley praised effusively in developing her into the accomplished player she has become.
“He’s my favorite coach of all time, and I owe all of my success to him,” she said. “He always pushes me to do my best in everything, not just on the court. After seven seasons together, he knows how my brain works and understands my emotions, especially during a game. He knew my abilities and believed in me, even when I didn’t.”
High school volleyball may have come to an end for Shirley, but she’s not finished yet. In addition to one more club season under Godfrey’s tutelage, Shirley recently committed to play collegiately at Jefferson University in Philadelphia. She plans to major in Pharmacy at the school, which competes at the Division II level in athletics.
In the classroom, Shirley challenges herself to seek constant improvement in the classroom, much like she does on the volleyball court. As her intended major indicates, she is a lover of the sciences and has taken AP courses in biology and chemistry. The idea of becoming a pharmacist is appealing to Shirley’s helpful nature.
“I love the idea of it because you can help people in so many different ways,” she said.
When she’s not playing volleyball and acing her studies (which isn’t all that often), Shirley holds down a job as a shift manager at a local ice cream shop, her favorite working experience to date. At school, she’s also a member of the HOSA Club, a student organization for future health professionals.
One thing is abundantly clear about Shirley: she won’t be easy to replace as a student-athlete at CB South, especially on the volleyball court. However, she represents more than just a skilled competitive athlete.
“She is a caring, exceptional person inside and out,” Godfrey said. “Just an exact example of what a captain and friend should be. On the court, she was the one constant presence we had. Great mindset, attitude and work ethic, and I’ll really miss the familiarity I have with her. Watching her grow as a player and person has been a distinct favorite memory of mine.”
There’s plenty more volleyball in Shirley’s future, but she will always be most thankful for these last four years and what they represent in her overall journey, especially considering how seemingly random circumstances gave her a start in the sport.
“My life would have been so completely different,” she said. “I couldn’t imagine what it would be like and I don’t know where I would be without it. In addition to my teammates who are my best friends, my South coaches all helped me improve my attitude and effort. It made me a great teammate, and that will only help me at the collegiate level. High school volleyball absolutely made me the person I am today.”
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