DERBY – Only in its second year of competitive play, Derby High School’s girls’ volleyball team served up a helping of dedication and selflessness that scored them a place in the 2024 state tournament.
Although the team got eliminated in November after the first round of play — having lost to North Branford 3 – 0 — just qualifying for the CIAC (Connecticut Interscholastic Athletic Conference) state tournament was a dream come true.
“We were a second-year program this year and went from 1 – 19 our first year in 2023 to going 10 – 10 in 2024 and making the state tournament,” said head coach Tara Dering. “I’m excited and really proud of them. I know for myself and the girls, our goal for the whole season was to get to the state tournament. We had a lot of seniors this year, and it was important for them, especially because this was only our second year playing.”
Derby High School has never had a volleyball team.
For senior co-captain Brianna Kling, who earned second team, All-Naugatuck Valley (NVL) honors both as a junior and senior, making it into the state tournament was the icing on the cake.
“Last year everyone in our program knew that we had a special and talented team,” Brianna said. “I think it might’ve been easy to forget that not only was it Derby’s first time having a volleyball program, but it was also the first time nearly all of our players had touched a volleyball in a competitive fashion. Despite going 1 – 19 in our first season, we knew that we would have enough talent and enough time to continue to develop for the following year, and that was shown with us going 10 – 10 and qualifying for the state tournament this past season.”
Brianna attributed several things to the team’s marked improvement.
“I believe the main thing that propelled us to success was dedication and selflessness,” she said. “Players and coaches attended conditioning sessions and practices multiple times a week over our summer break. We also had players who worked to learn entirely new positions, even if they did not initially want to, so that we could implement a new offensive system. Buying into doing what’s necessary for team success instead of being solely concerned about our individual performance is definitely what helped us improve our overall play. Everyone just wanted the team to win.”
It was Brianna, 17, who has played volleyball since she was in elementary school, that brought the idea of forming a team to Dering when she was in middle school. Dering teaches health and physical education at Derby Middle School. She was captain of her high school volleyball team at Branford High School, and served as assistant coach at Daniel Hand High School, before coming to Derby.
“I had Brianna as a student at Derby Middle School and she expressed interest to me and former (head) coach Josh Dydyn (now, the current assistant coach) about starting a varsity team,” Dering said. “We always wanted a team and knew there were other kids who were interested.”
Dering said a volleyball club was launched in 2022. After an approval from the Derby Board of Education and getting the go-ahead from the CIAC to form a varsity program, the Derby Red Raiders Girls’ Volleyball team became official in 2023.
There is both a varsity and junior varsity team, with 19 girls in grades 9 – 12 making up last season’s roster. The team starts practicing six days a week over the summer and the season kicks off in September and runs to early November. They play 20 games each season.
Dering credited the leadership of Brianna and fellow co-captain Quin Gray for taking a first-year team made up of girls who’ve never played competitive volleyball before to a cohesive unit who aced their way to a place in the state tournament.
“Our seniors really emerged as great leaders,” Dering said. “During our first year there was a lot of building fundamental skills and we tried to build a culture. It was a lot all at once. Even though we were 1 – 19 the first season, there were some really close games. That really motivated us this year to get that revenge win. We beat a lot of the teams we lost to last year. There was a shift in the mentality, a lot more leadership and holding each other accountable.”
As for going into next year’s season, despite losing several seniors, Dering said the team is dedicated to continuing its momentum.
“This really was a special team, all the girls have individual personalities but they all just gelled together, and it felt like the team was a family,” Dering said. “These are hard-working girls. Going into next year, we’re losing six seniors, but we have some really talented underclassmen, and there’s definitely some strength in the younger players.”
The Roster
Head Coach: Tara Dering; Assistant Coach: Josh Dydyn
Managers: Savannah Harold, Giana Akter
The 2024 Roster:
Melanie Fearon
Jerlena Alexander
Quinlan Gray — Captain
Sheahan Gray
Alexandra Karaleva
Skylah Clarke
Ava Umpierre
Kaylee Mair
Kristian Fearon
Skylar Anderson
Samantha Milano
Aniyah Roman
Brianna Kling — Captain
Miley Collins
Karlissa Philemy
Faith Men
Vanessa Nguyen
