Jordan, Mark and Maddi Nell
Softball Diamond to Volleyball Court: A Look Back With Maddi Nell
8/25/2020 1:32:00 PM | Women's Volleyball
HASKINS, Ohio - Growing up in rural Ohio, a young Maddi Nell would spend hours upon hours with her father and brother on the baseball field.
Nell's father, Mark, a former collegiate player at Cincinnati, had turned down the opportunity to play in Major League Baseball to coach and teach the game. Her brother Jordan would go on to play collegiate baseball as well. It was all but certain that Maddi would follow in their footsteps and play collegiate softball.
But the path for Nell would eventually shift away from the diamond and to the volleyball court, where she developed her skills to become a Division I student-athlete at Purdue Fort Wayne in a sport in which no one who knew her would expect. Since Nell's father has been the baseball coach at Anthony Wayne High School for the last 21 years and coached travel ball, she would spend her summers on the field. She would help him paint lines on the field before every game, and it wasn't long before every opposing coach knew her by name. Her brother, Jordan played for her dad, so the three of them spent countless hours on the diamond together.
After Jordan had graduated from high school, Mark's coaching moved over to Maddi. The former collegiate player had high expectations for his daughter, but Nell had even higher expectations for herself.
"I put it on myself," Nell said. "I would be fielding ground balls and my dad would try to tell us to go home and I would say we're not leaving until we can't see anymore."
The dynamic that came from the father coaching his daughter brought the two of them closer together.
Nell was a three-sport athlete going into high school, playing basketball and volleyball when she wasn't on the softball field. When she reached high school, she tried out for the Premier Academy club team that required her to play volleyball exclusively.
"I was very stressed," Nell said. "I was 14 and I had never made a decision for myself."
Her parents let the decision remain hers, and she chose to be a setter, giving up her time as a slap hitter.
"I was already starting to get burnt out on softball a little bit," Nell said. "And I knew that if I kept playing I was definitely going to be burnt out by college. My heart was in volleyball."
As a 14-year-old freshman, Nell played as the backup setter on the U-17 team, trying to accelerate her growth as a player. When she traveled with the team to tournaments, they would have their phones taken away to limit distractions, but for Nell, it kept her away from her family even more.
"Giving up softball was tough on my dad because he thought it was going to be giving up on our relationship," Nell said.
The decision to play volleyball proved to be the right choice for Nell, as she went on to break the single-season and career assists records at Otsego High School, and gain the attention of Purdue Fort Wayne through her club team.
When playing at Otsego, Nell ran the team. She was the centerpiece of the team that had success at the smaller, Division 5 level high school. And just right down the road with her club, Nell was pushed more into the background. Playing with the older kids at the Premier Academy, however, helped her develop at a faster rate. This development paved the way for her collegiate career, as she signed her NLI to play at Purdue Fort Wayne in April of 2019, the spring before she was due on campus.
In her freshman season in 2019, Nell split time running a 6-2 offense, sharing the setting duties with Madison Gates and Kendyll Gebert. She started in five matches and played in 26, helping Purdue Fort Wayne to its first National Invitational Volleyball Championship berth.
In the summer of 2020, Nell made the trip home to her spend time with her family until classes resumed in August. She returned to the field on which she grew up to play catch, take batting practice and field some ground balls with her father. She even took the time to relive the nostalgia-filled activity of lining the field with her dad to prepare for games.
"I think he definitely misses watching me play softball as I miss playing it, but he tells me almost everyday how much he loves watching me play volleyball and do what I love," Nell said. "Since he played Division I college baseball he definitely wanted to see his kids be successful in sports so me playing a D-I sport is definitely making him proud no matter what sport it is. He will always be my number one fan whether it's on the field, on the court, in the classroom, or in life."
Now that classes are back in session and students have returned to the Purdue Fort Wayne campus, Nell is back with her team and preparing for the Mastodons' first season in the Horizon League.
Nell's father, Mark, a former collegiate player at Cincinnati, had turned down the opportunity to play in Major League Baseball to coach and teach the game. Her brother Jordan would go on to play collegiate baseball as well. It was all but certain that Maddi would follow in their footsteps and play collegiate softball.
But the path for Nell would eventually shift away from the diamond and to the volleyball court, where she developed her skills to become a Division I student-athlete at Purdue Fort Wayne in a sport in which no one who knew her would expect. Since Nell's father has been the baseball coach at Anthony Wayne High School for the last 21 years and coached travel ball, she would spend her summers on the field. She would help him paint lines on the field before every game, and it wasn't long before every opposing coach knew her by name. Her brother, Jordan played for her dad, so the three of them spent countless hours on the diamond together.
After Jordan had graduated from high school, Mark's coaching moved over to Maddi. The former collegiate player had high expectations for his daughter, but Nell had even higher expectations for herself.
"I put it on myself," Nell said. "I would be fielding ground balls and my dad would try to tell us to go home and I would say we're not leaving until we can't see anymore."
The dynamic that came from the father coaching his daughter brought the two of them closer together.
Nell was a three-sport athlete going into high school, playing basketball and volleyball when she wasn't on the softball field. When she reached high school, she tried out for the Premier Academy club team that required her to play volleyball exclusively.
"I was very stressed," Nell said. "I was 14 and I had never made a decision for myself."
Her parents let the decision remain hers, and she chose to be a setter, giving up her time as a slap hitter.
"I was already starting to get burnt out on softball a little bit," Nell said. "And I knew that if I kept playing I was definitely going to be burnt out by college. My heart was in volleyball."
As a 14-year-old freshman, Nell played as the backup setter on the U-17 team, trying to accelerate her growth as a player. When she traveled with the team to tournaments, they would have their phones taken away to limit distractions, but for Nell, it kept her away from her family even more.
"Giving up softball was tough on my dad because he thought it was going to be giving up on our relationship," Nell said.
The decision to play volleyball proved to be the right choice for Nell, as she went on to break the single-season and career assists records at Otsego High School, and gain the attention of Purdue Fort Wayne through her club team.
When playing at Otsego, Nell ran the team. She was the centerpiece of the team that had success at the smaller, Division 5 level high school. And just right down the road with her club, Nell was pushed more into the background. Playing with the older kids at the Premier Academy, however, helped her develop at a faster rate. This development paved the way for her collegiate career, as she signed her NLI to play at Purdue Fort Wayne in April of 2019, the spring before she was due on campus.
In her freshman season in 2019, Nell split time running a 6-2 offense, sharing the setting duties with Madison Gates and Kendyll Gebert. She started in five matches and played in 26, helping Purdue Fort Wayne to its first National Invitational Volleyball Championship berth.
In the summer of 2020, Nell made the trip home to her spend time with her family until classes resumed in August. She returned to the field on which she grew up to play catch, take batting practice and field some ground balls with her father. She even took the time to relive the nostalgia-filled activity of lining the field with her dad to prepare for games.
"I think he definitely misses watching me play softball as I miss playing it, but he tells me almost everyday how much he loves watching me play volleyball and do what I love," Nell said. "Since he played Division I college baseball he definitely wanted to see his kids be successful in sports so me playing a D-I sport is definitely making him proud no matter what sport it is. He will always be my number one fan whether it's on the field, on the court, in the classroom, or in life."
Now that classes are back in session and students have returned to the Purdue Fort Wayne campus, Nell is back with her team and preparing for the Mastodons' first season in the Horizon League.
~ Feel the Rumble ~
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