SEROTE DIGS BEING A VOLLEYBALL PLAYER

Volleyball player Richard Serote is happy, real happy.

Can he be happier?

You bet.

All he needs is a medal to cap the current Ontario Colleges Athletic Association season and, talking with the 22-year old Toronto native, he is optimistic it can happen.

Like most athletes, Serote began the season with some personal objectives.

One of them was to have the kind of season he would remember for many years from now.

So far, so good and with the post-season round of playoffs still to go, and the George Brown College Huskies men's volleyball team set to show that the season was no fluke, Serote can look at a 16-4 regular season schedule.

For the record, the Huskies finished with the third best record among 21 teams.

And what has put lots of smiles on the face of the 5-foot-6 athlete, who plays the Libero position, is his ability to exceed a goal of being among the top five OCAA players in the category of digs. 

"The goal was to make top five and I finished at No. 4," said an elated Serote. "I had 196 digs – real happy about that number and very proud of my accomplishment. My job is not to score points, but to run the backcourt and prevent opposing teams from scoring."

While Serote had a remarkable back-to-back series with Cambrian and Boreal, combining for 27 digs in the series with the Sudbury-area Colleges, his biggest total came against Seneca College of Toronto. Serote recorded 19 digs in a win last November.

"That was very special to me, played with lots of confidence and just felt myself getting better and better," he said.

Serote, a former high school Athlete of the Year, is the same player who came off the bench last year when the team finished 8-12 and missed the playoffs. This year, he was a starter and loving every minute of the experience.

And Serote, with one more year left before graduating in Business Administration, can smile a bit more knowing his successful season may not have occurred if he hadn't become disenchanted with a job he took shortly after graduating from Bloor Collegiate.

"I worked as a produce clerk in a grocery store," he said. "I just got fed up stacking shelves with fruits and vegetables. I knew I was going nowhere, wasted lots of time, just wasn't motivated and knew it was time to get moving. I had to get a career."

After getting a few additional academic credits to qualify for George Brown, Serote is now thinking about his Bachelor of Arts and Masters in Business Administration at Ryerson. Then, one day, maybe, opening a business.

Source: George Brown College

Photo Credit: Michael Stefancic