Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, September 16, 1993 TAG: 9309180111
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: S-12 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: By BOB TEITLEBAUM STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Blair Calvert was a gym rat who learned to love volleyball at an early age.
As a first-grader waiting for a ride home from North Cross, where her sister Michelle was practicing with the volleyball team, Calvert became devoted to the game.
"While Michelle was practicing, I'd hit the ball up against the wall until practice was over, or some of the players would hit with me," Calvert says.
By the time she was in sixth grade, Calvert was on the junior varsity.
Today, the junior middle attacker is one of the stars of what arguably is Roanoke's best volleyball team. Last year, the Raiders dominated Group AAA teams in fall volleyball while winning the Blue Ridge Conference.
They did this without Calvert, who tore the anterior cruciate ligament in her left knee early in the season.
Losing a sophomore might not have seemed that important, but it was. After all, Calvert had been rotating into the starting lineup as an eighth-grader and was a full-time starter as a freshman.
Calvert also plays softball and basketball. The love of sports comes from her father, Dave Calvert, the head of the middle school at North Cross; he played three sports at William Fleming.
Donna Satterwhite, who has been at North Cross since the early 1970s as a volleyball, basketball and softball coach, says, "Blair has the most natural ability of any athlete I've coached. I don't think there's anyone who wouldn't agree."
So it was distressing when Calvert suffered a serious injury. Satterwhite was losing her best softball player and one of her volleyball stars. Since Calvert had given up basketball as a freshman, it didn't appear that losing her would affect that team.
"Blair sprained her knee in preseason and played against Cave Spring," Satterwhite says. "Then, warming up against Patrick Henry, she went up to hit the ball and came down [wrong]."
"I knew it was serious," says Calvert, recalling how she felt when she landed. "I had a feeling I'd have to have surgery. Even the Patrick Henry trainer felt I'd have to have surgery."
Still, Calvert wasn't ready to quit.
"Volleyball is my favorite sport and I wanted to come back," she says. "They said no way and sent me right to the hospital."
Surgery on the anterior cruciate ligament can mean anywhere from a few months to more than a year of rehabilitation. Amy Moore, a soccer and basketball player at Salem whose mother, Gaylyn Moore, teaches at North Cross and coaches the Spartans, still has not fully recovered from the same surgery in the spring. Marcus Parker, Salem's All-Timesland running back, had the same surgery at the beginning of the summer; he expects to play football this season.
"Amy has my crutches," says Calvert, who was back playing softball in the spring after her injury.
North Cross plays slow-pitch softball, and Calvert was given permission only to pitch. However, in summer recreation ball she was back at her old position of shortstop, and now, less than a year after surgery, she seems to have regained all her athletic skills.
As with most injured athletes, the toughest time is sitting on the sideline.
"I came to all the volleyball games and all of my dad's games," Calvert says. "Ms. Satterwhite helped me a lot the whole time. She kept on me about working out. That helped me come back quickly.
"The doctor told me if I worked out and lifted weights, I should get back the same strength in my knee that I had before. I don't have to wear a knee brace in volleyball, but I don't go without one [in case I need it]."
Calvert may resume playing basketball this year, and she will be back at shortstop for the softball team.
"I decided not to play basketball [as a freshman] because my dad was coaching junior varsity [boys' basketball] and I wanted to see some of his games. I also wanted a break," Calvert says. "I'm leaning toward playing basketball, but I'll wait until after the volleyball season and see how my knee is."
Calvert is looking to go to a school such as Radford University to study nursing and hopes to play volleyball and softball in college, but that's in the future. There still are nearly two seasons of volleyball remaining with the team to beat in the Roanoke area.
by CNB