Ogbechi Anxious To Start Season

Been to a Harvard women’s volleyball game recently? If you have, one thing’s for certain. You can’t help but notice Kaego Ogbechie.

The long legs. The hair. The energy.

But this year, something is different about Harvard’s middle hitter. She’s on the sidelines.

The junior is out of action indefinitely with a tear in her patella tendon. It’s the first time Ogbechie has had a serious injury that has kept her out of competition since she started playing volleyball in the eighth grade.

“It’s a very difficult injury to deal with,” she said. “There was some talk about surgery, but I don’t feel like I’m actually ready to do that yet. This is a really important

year for me, academically and athletically.”

Ogbechie has built up quite a resume during her two seasons at Harvard.

Last year, Ogbechie became the first Crimson player to earn Ivy League Player of the Year honors. She led the league in kills and was only the second player in league history to be named an AVCA Northeast Regional All-American. In her freshman year, she earned the Ivy League’s Rookie of the Year award after winning Rookie of the Week four times during the season.

Ogbechie was also named to the All-Tournament teams at both the Crimson Classic and New England Challenge.

Not too shabby.

In just two years with Ogbechie, the Harvard women’s volleyball team improved from a 3-11 record in Ivy League play in 2001 to 9-2 in 2002.

“It was a great opportunity for Harvard volleyball to have that caliber come in,” Harvard coach Jennifer Weiss said.

With all of Ogbechie’s successes, the beginning of this year has presented quite a challenge.

Because of the nature of the injury, Ogbechie has to take it day by day.

“With this, it’s so subjective—how do I feel this morning? How bad has it been this week? Can I play? Can I even practice?” she said.

As she put it, Ogbechie is dealing. She has a great attitude about her injury, although her disappointed is clear.

“It’s difficult to set that aside, your own personal problems, and just be a part of the team,” she said. “It wouldn’t make sense for me to mope around and act like it was the end of the world. So I try to do my best.”

“The team is very supportive,” Weiss said. “We’re just going to try to do what’s best for Kaego.”

As the team travels to Ogbechie’s neck of the woods in California this weekend, her play status is doubtful. “I haven’t seen my family in a long time, and I’m sure they want to see me play,” she said. “But I know in the long run, it will be best for me to take some time off or go easy on it.”

Unlike many Division I athletes, Ogbechie did not grow up playing volleyball. She did not even start playing the sport until eighth grade. Before that, she had been a track and field star, competing primarily in jumping and long distance running events.

“A lot of my closer friends were on the [volleyball] team in seventh grade and told me about how fun it was,” Ogbechie said. “I thought it’d be cool to be on a different team and be able to hang out with them after school. I just started playing.”

Ogbechie’s success was not immediate. In fact, she spent a lot of time on the bench that first year. “But I was coordinated—I could run and jump and do physical things—and the coaches definitely wanted to mold me into a better player,” she said. “I was very raw.”

With only one middle school season behind her, Ogbechie moved to a new district, which meant a brand new high school. She skipped the freshman-sophomore team and jumped to the JV squad without ever attending a volleyball camp or playing on a club team.

Ogbechie caught on quickly and played both front and back row during that first high school season. She worked to refine her technique, but Ogbechie still didn’t know much about the world of volleyball.

After hearing talk about club teams, Ogbechie decided to try out. It was here when Ogbechie started to realize her potential. “My coach was amazing,” she said. “She taught me all the basics and made me think.”

With her club experience, Ogbechie made the varsity team as a sophomore, where she was a starter for three years, team MVP twice, and first-team San Gabrielle Valley.

It was not surprising that Ogbechie was recruited by a number of colleges. She was coveted by many Ivy League schools in addition to great volleyball universities across the east and west coasts. She was even offered a full athletic scholarship to UC-Berkley. But in the end, Ogbechie decided to return to her birth city of Boston.

“My parents are definitely advocates of ‘school comes first’ and ‘read your books,’” she said. “They say it so many times to me.” Clearly, her time with the books has paid off. Ogbechie was named as a Top 5 Sierra League Student, an honor presented to the five most distinguished students in her class of 767.

But as much as Ogbechie may enjoy academics, something tells me she may not be satisfied reading for the remainder of the season.