Net Posts With Natalie Robinson
September 28, 2017 | Volleyball
After first coming to watch Husky volleyball during the National Championship 2005 season, Natalie Robinson dreamed about playing for the Huskies one day. A dozen years later, she's helping the Huskies on another championship chase. Robinson grew up near Alki Beach in West Seattle, then moved to Mercer Island before high school. Playing both indoor and beach volleyball, Robinson developed a strong all-around game that helped her become one of the top players in the state, and she earned a chance to become a Dawg, appearing in two matches so far this season. She talked to GoHuskies.com this week, right before heading to her first college classes.
GoHuskies.com: Classes are finally getting started this week. What is your schedule going to look like now with school starting?
Natalie Robinson: I have a pretty light fall load. I'm taking Econ which has lecture twice a week and quiz section on Fridays, then I'm also taking a Freshman Interest Group with a General Studies associated with that, then I'm taking a Gender Women's Studies Special Topic class, and I don't know a lot about it but from what I can see it focuses on protests and how they relate to women's rights without history, which I think will be super interesting.
GH: Are you already thinking about pursuing a particular major?
NR: I want to do Business. I'm taking all the Business pre-reqs over my freshman and sophomore years, so Economics is one of them then I'll have to do Accounting, and Intro to Law, and Marketing and different things, so I'm trying to get all those out of the way.
GH: When did Business first start to interest you?
NR: I originally always wanted to be a teacher, until my junior year of high school I was in a marketing class and they had a competition called DECA, which is a big business, finance, and marketing competition, and I did it for fun and ended up placing and going to Internationals for DECA, which were in Anaheim. So I did that junior and senior years and it turned out I was decent at it, and I really enjoyed the topics and found them fun, so since then I decided to pursue Business.
GH: How did you first get started in volleyball? Did you play many other sports and was volleyball always your main love?
NR: My dad played volleyball, so it's kind of always been in the family. But I played soccer, I swam, I did track, and I did gymnastics until I hit a growth spurt, and I also did water polo my freshman year of high school. But I always did soccer and swimming. Since fifth grade volleyball has definitely been my biggest passion and the thing that I've been the most excited about.
GH: How did your dad playing help you through your career?
NR: My dad taught me how to play, and he's always been the person I look up to in volleyball, but he's been good about separating himself from coaching, and more just peppering with me and talking things out when I wanted to talk about it, so he's been really big influence there. He played beach and he was pretty good, I still can't beat him most of the time.
GH: Were you always a setter?
NR: I started setting in U13's, but I've always kind of played everything. I've always been kind of a utility player, just kind of hit, set, dug, whatever needed to be done, which is true here too. But I have really liked setting since 14's, and then going into high school I always set. But I also played right side for lots of years before I came here.
GH: So you played a lot of beach growing up as well?
NR: Yeah, my first road trip was to watch my dad play beach volleyball, so I've always been around it, and I started playing seriously the year after I started playing indoor. I always played club beach as much as you can in Seattle, and then all summer training with my dad on the beach just for fun and to stay in shape.
GH: Were there some beach courts on Mercer Island for you?
NR: There's one, it's kind of a hidden treasure. It's on the west side of the island, and my dad and I wrote up plans to have the city redesign the court, so it's really nice now. So I did a lot of training on there.
GH: It's been almost two full months now since practice started, so how would you sum up the experience so far? Has it been what you expected?
NR: It's been fun and intense, I think those are the two main words for it. Everybody told me coming in, previous players, coaches, everyone said be ready, you don't even know what you don't know yet. I think that's really true. I've learned so many aspects of volleyball that I didn't even know existed prior to coming in. So it's been a lot of learning, and a lot of accepting that I might have to get worse before I get better, which has been challenging. I've been pretty comfortable with my ability level for a couple years now, and that's just been turned upside-down here, which is really cool. I feel like I'm starting to improve again, which was been really interesting. So it's been a lot of just accepting that it's not going to be pretty while I'm getting better, and that I just need to keep working. It's been fun though, the girls have been awesome and super supportive.
GH: You have gotten into a few matches this year. Did you think you would play this season or did you expect to redshirt?
NR: I didn't think a ton about it. I knew coming in behind Bailey and Jade that redshirting was a possibility because they're both such amazing setters and I can learn so much from them, but I also knew that I was capable of serving and playing defense and that if they needed me to do that, that would be a really fun opportunity, so it was kind of just going in with an open mind and wherever they needed me I was going to be there.
GH: How did it feel checking in for the first time?
NR: I didn't expect to play in the match that I first played in, but I did feel prepared to play. It was nervewracking playing in Alaska Airlines Arena in front of all the fans, but it was fun, and I think I learned a lot even in that first serve I did just about collecting yourself and being ready. Since then, even though I'm on the bench I feel ready at any moment and I practice as if I'm going to play every single weekend. That's not just something I say, with injuries anything can happen so I'm always ready to play and training as if I'm going to be playing.
GH: It seems like you, Emma, and Lauren have bonded pretty quickly.
NR: We're best friends. Once we all committed, we made a group chat and we saw each other at tournaments, and we really just connected. Emma and I came for summer and we were roommates and we connected right away. People started calling us the twins and we did everything together, so we had the summer and then Lauren came later in the summer and she fit right in with us and just became a group of three automatically. So we didn't know each other previously very well, but luckily we all connected really well and have been able to become super close friends really fast. We live together with a fourth girl who is on the beach team, who just arrived this week ago so we don't her well yet but she's been really fun too.
GH: Was playing at Washington always a goal for you growing up in the area?
NR: I grew up coming to Husky games. I went to my first game in '05, which was a pretty cool year to have come. So I always grew up saying, "I'm going to go to Washington!" but it was always just this far-off dream. As I got into recruiting I realized it was not that realistic to say I'm going to Washington, even though I was subconsciously working towards that. So I actually looked at a lot of other schools before Washington, and they contacted me, I didn't even reach out because I thought it was far out. But they contacted me and I came on a visit, I loved it, I got to know what actually going to Washington meant, not just this dream that my 10-year-old self had. My parents were pressuring me to go out of state and do something different, but I ended up really loving it and I came here. So it wasn't something that I had always counted on, but it was definitely a dream come true for my younger self.
GH: If you started coming in '05, is it cool getting to work with Courtney Thompson this season?
NR: It's cool, it's very full circle. It's pretty amazing to show up on the first day of preseason and have her in the room. She's been really great even though she's not here every day, but it's pretty cool to see what one of your idols looks like in a more day-to-day situation.
GH: What was really the clincher to want to come to UW?
NR: I guess just the culture, everybody talks about how amazing it is to be part of Washington Athletics. There's just such a full package here, the academics, the coaches, the girls, team expectations, and then obviously the success is pretty unbeatable. So just the entire culture of Washington volleyball seemed like a really good fit for me.
GH: How has it been just moving out and adjusting to dorm life so far?
NR: I was looking forward to it. I've always been close with my family but I'm also pretty independent and I was looking forward to taking that next step into being an adult, and seeing how responsible I could be on my own. My parents always gave me a lot of freedom, but I would also say I was pretty sheltered on Mercer Island, so it's been really fun to kind of interact with a more diverse group of people, and learning how to work with more people has been really cool. And my parents are close, if I need anything, they come to the home games, but I'm trying to stay here and live the full college experience and not fall back on the fact that they're close. It's been fun.
GH: Any other hobbies or things you do for fun?
NR: I really like babysitting! Probably won't have much of a chance in college, but that's the only other thing I did besides volleyball.
GoHuskies.com: Classes are finally getting started this week. What is your schedule going to look like now with school starting?
Natalie Robinson: I have a pretty light fall load. I'm taking Econ which has lecture twice a week and quiz section on Fridays, then I'm also taking a Freshman Interest Group with a General Studies associated with that, then I'm taking a Gender Women's Studies Special Topic class, and I don't know a lot about it but from what I can see it focuses on protests and how they relate to women's rights without history, which I think will be super interesting.
GH: Are you already thinking about pursuing a particular major?
NR: I want to do Business. I'm taking all the Business pre-reqs over my freshman and sophomore years, so Economics is one of them then I'll have to do Accounting, and Intro to Law, and Marketing and different things, so I'm trying to get all those out of the way.
GH: When did Business first start to interest you?
NR: I originally always wanted to be a teacher, until my junior year of high school I was in a marketing class and they had a competition called DECA, which is a big business, finance, and marketing competition, and I did it for fun and ended up placing and going to Internationals for DECA, which were in Anaheim. So I did that junior and senior years and it turned out I was decent at it, and I really enjoyed the topics and found them fun, so since then I decided to pursue Business.
GH: How did you first get started in volleyball? Did you play many other sports and was volleyball always your main love?
NR: My dad played volleyball, so it's kind of always been in the family. But I played soccer, I swam, I did track, and I did gymnastics until I hit a growth spurt, and I also did water polo my freshman year of high school. But I always did soccer and swimming. Since fifth grade volleyball has definitely been my biggest passion and the thing that I've been the most excited about.
GH: How did your dad playing help you through your career?
NR: My dad taught me how to play, and he's always been the person I look up to in volleyball, but he's been good about separating himself from coaching, and more just peppering with me and talking things out when I wanted to talk about it, so he's been really big influence there. He played beach and he was pretty good, I still can't beat him most of the time.
GH: Were you always a setter?
NR: I started setting in U13's, but I've always kind of played everything. I've always been kind of a utility player, just kind of hit, set, dug, whatever needed to be done, which is true here too. But I have really liked setting since 14's, and then going into high school I always set. But I also played right side for lots of years before I came here.
GH: So you played a lot of beach growing up as well?
NR: Yeah, my first road trip was to watch my dad play beach volleyball, so I've always been around it, and I started playing seriously the year after I started playing indoor. I always played club beach as much as you can in Seattle, and then all summer training with my dad on the beach just for fun and to stay in shape.
GH: Were there some beach courts on Mercer Island for you?
NR: There's one, it's kind of a hidden treasure. It's on the west side of the island, and my dad and I wrote up plans to have the city redesign the court, so it's really nice now. So I did a lot of training on there.
GH: It's been almost two full months now since practice started, so how would you sum up the experience so far? Has it been what you expected?
NR: It's been fun and intense, I think those are the two main words for it. Everybody told me coming in, previous players, coaches, everyone said be ready, you don't even know what you don't know yet. I think that's really true. I've learned so many aspects of volleyball that I didn't even know existed prior to coming in. So it's been a lot of learning, and a lot of accepting that I might have to get worse before I get better, which has been challenging. I've been pretty comfortable with my ability level for a couple years now, and that's just been turned upside-down here, which is really cool. I feel like I'm starting to improve again, which was been really interesting. So it's been a lot of just accepting that it's not going to be pretty while I'm getting better, and that I just need to keep working. It's been fun though, the girls have been awesome and super supportive.
GH: You have gotten into a few matches this year. Did you think you would play this season or did you expect to redshirt?
NR: I didn't think a ton about it. I knew coming in behind Bailey and Jade that redshirting was a possibility because they're both such amazing setters and I can learn so much from them, but I also knew that I was capable of serving and playing defense and that if they needed me to do that, that would be a really fun opportunity, so it was kind of just going in with an open mind and wherever they needed me I was going to be there.
GH: How did it feel checking in for the first time?
NR: I didn't expect to play in the match that I first played in, but I did feel prepared to play. It was nervewracking playing in Alaska Airlines Arena in front of all the fans, but it was fun, and I think I learned a lot even in that first serve I did just about collecting yourself and being ready. Since then, even though I'm on the bench I feel ready at any moment and I practice as if I'm going to play every single weekend. That's not just something I say, with injuries anything can happen so I'm always ready to play and training as if I'm going to be playing.
GH: It seems like you, Emma, and Lauren have bonded pretty quickly.
NR: We're best friends. Once we all committed, we made a group chat and we saw each other at tournaments, and we really just connected. Emma and I came for summer and we were roommates and we connected right away. People started calling us the twins and we did everything together, so we had the summer and then Lauren came later in the summer and she fit right in with us and just became a group of three automatically. So we didn't know each other previously very well, but luckily we all connected really well and have been able to become super close friends really fast. We live together with a fourth girl who is on the beach team, who just arrived this week ago so we don't her well yet but she's been really fun too.
GH: Was playing at Washington always a goal for you growing up in the area?
NR: I grew up coming to Husky games. I went to my first game in '05, which was a pretty cool year to have come. So I always grew up saying, "I'm going to go to Washington!" but it was always just this far-off dream. As I got into recruiting I realized it was not that realistic to say I'm going to Washington, even though I was subconsciously working towards that. So I actually looked at a lot of other schools before Washington, and they contacted me, I didn't even reach out because I thought it was far out. But they contacted me and I came on a visit, I loved it, I got to know what actually going to Washington meant, not just this dream that my 10-year-old self had. My parents were pressuring me to go out of state and do something different, but I ended up really loving it and I came here. So it wasn't something that I had always counted on, but it was definitely a dream come true for my younger self.
GH: If you started coming in '05, is it cool getting to work with Courtney Thompson this season?
NR: It's cool, it's very full circle. It's pretty amazing to show up on the first day of preseason and have her in the room. She's been really great even though she's not here every day, but it's pretty cool to see what one of your idols looks like in a more day-to-day situation.
GH: What was really the clincher to want to come to UW?
NR: I guess just the culture, everybody talks about how amazing it is to be part of Washington Athletics. There's just such a full package here, the academics, the coaches, the girls, team expectations, and then obviously the success is pretty unbeatable. So just the entire culture of Washington volleyball seemed like a really good fit for me.
GH: How has it been just moving out and adjusting to dorm life so far?
NR: I was looking forward to it. I've always been close with my family but I'm also pretty independent and I was looking forward to taking that next step into being an adult, and seeing how responsible I could be on my own. My parents always gave me a lot of freedom, but I would also say I was pretty sheltered on Mercer Island, so it's been really fun to kind of interact with a more diverse group of people, and learning how to work with more people has been really cool. And my parents are close, if I need anything, they come to the home games, but I'm trying to stay here and live the full college experience and not fall back on the fact that they're close. It's been fun.
GH: Any other hobbies or things you do for fun?
NR: I really like babysitting! Probably won't have much of a chance in college, but that's the only other thing I did besides volleyball.
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