Zoe Jarvis, a former volleyball player from Texas, has traveled the world, but she always returns to Texas.
Jarvis is going to a Volleyball Nations League competition in Arlington this coming weekend. Jarvis is presently a professional volleyball player with League One Volleyball in Austin. She did, however, play for the Longhorns in college, which is where her Texas roots began.
Even though she only played for the team for a year, Jarvis credits her time in burnt orange with some of her best friendships both on and off the court.
Jarvis remarked, “I knew it would be a high level of volleyball.” I had no idea that some of my closest friends would become my pals. Jerritt Elliot, the head volleyball coach in Texas, officiated my wedding. One of my bridesmaids was his wife. I never would have imagined that my closest pals would all be from Texas.
Although she was still a sophomore at UC Santa Barbara, she remembers her first volleyball match at Texas Gregory Gym as a turning point in her career. Before spending two seasons at UCLA, Jarvis made her debut there as a walk-on libero.
“It was honestly the most enjoyable volleyball match I’ve ever played,” Jarvis recalled of his final match for UC Santa Barbara, which took place in Gregory Gym during his second year at Texas. I was certain that visiting Texas was something I wanted to do before turning pro.
She finally became a Longhorn in 2022 after spending her entire senior year in the transfer portal.
The team ended up winning the 2022 NCAA championship after Jarvis joined a talented group of returners and transfer players.
Jarvis remarked, “To be honest, it was a fairytale.” Everyone was so committed, including the players who were unable to travel, the staff, and the starters, yet I believe we were favored to win the entire season.
Even though Jarvis loved her year at Texas, she was aware that her college eligibility would expire at the end of the 2022 season.
Since there was no established path for athletes to enter the American professional volleyball scene, Jarvis spent two seasons playing for Germany before coming back to Austin to play for its brand-new LOVB squad.
Her most noteworthy championships to date, around six years after her college debut, are as follows: NCAA champion, 2023 NORCECA Pan American Cup Final Six gold medalist, 2023 Pan-American Volleyball Cup bronze medalist, and League One Volleyball first-season champion.
Jarvis attributes some of the success to Austin fans after the team won the LOVB title in the league’s first year.
According to her, the Texas fan base travels and attends our away games. They simply adore volleyball. They adore us.
In an interview following the championship game, Madisen Skinner, a current LOVB Austin teammate and former college teammate, reiterated this opinion.
“Being able to compete here in front of our fans and the people who have supported us day in and day out is so special,” Skinner said, adding that the only alternative before to this was to travel abroad and be apart from family.
With a trip to the knockout stage on the line, Jarvis will now have the opportunity to represent Team USA in the third and last week of the VNL preliminary phase in Arlington, Texas, on July 9.
