TicketsOct. 18, 2010
By Shawn Sell
GoBEARCATS.com
Julie Guenther wants to make a living out of helping people. A senior member of the UC Volleyball team, Guenther is closing in on a degree in nursing, but thanks to an unfortunate incident in the preseason, she has had to start helping others a year earlier then planned.
Throughout her collegiate career, Guenther has seen an increase in playing team each season and was expected to replace four-year starting libero Jaime Frey this fall in the Bearcat line-up. But that all changed on August 9th during the team's first official practice of the 2010 season.
"I ruptured my Achilles tendon," she says quite simply. "We were doing our running test and it is a series of running up and backs on a basketball court. I went to cut on one of the endlines and it just snapped in half."
Guenther, who describes the initial pain as "about 9.5 out of 10," underwent surgery just two days later. Her head coach, Reed Sunahara, learned of the bad news while assisting the USA National Team overseas.
"I was on my trip (when she got hurt)," he recalls. "When I got the call, my heart just sank because I know how hard she has worked. She was really looking forward to her senior year and contributing to this team."
After seeing action in 25 matches as a freshman and all but four as a sophomore, Guenther became a fixture in UC's line-up last season, averaging a career-best 1.36 digs per set, including a personal-high 13 in an early season contest against Arizona State. With Guenther out of the picture from a playing perspective, Sunahara was faced with a choice between unproven sophomore Karen Onuki and true freshman Emily MacIntyre as the team's starting libero. Despite being sidelined, it didn't take Guenther long to find her niche with this year's squad.
"It's tough (not playing)," she admits. "I just try to stay upbeat and in some ways be a motivator for my teammates. I kind of feel like a coach a little bit, at least for the defensive specialists. Since we have such a young libero, if I see something, I just try to point it out as much as I can."
"She is helping the libero/defensive specialists out by just talking to them," Sunahara adds. "I think she is doing a good job with that because they respect her and they know that she has been in there before and knows what she is talking about. It helps when she says something because when Julie speaks, it means something. It's not like she is just yapping away and talking nonsense. If I were the younger kids, I would listen to what she is saying."
Along with mentoring her young position mates and cheering on all of her teammates, Guenther has continued to attend practice and travel with the team, while working to rehab her injured leg. Along the way, she has also made the decision to end her volleyball career after the year is over. While Sunahara knows his team will miss Guenther's contributions in a potential fifth year, he fully laid the decision in her hands.
"I left it all up to her," he says. "I never want a kid to feel like I am making a decision for them. Julie is the type of kid where she knows what she wants to do and she has her life mapped out. Coming back for a fifth year would have been tough academically because she is graduating in the spring. For her to come back would have been difficult, but it was her decision to make and live with."
One decision that Guenther made early on was that she wanted to be a nurse after completing her academic and athletic career at UC. Guenther, who says she loves children and would enjoy a career in pediatric care after graduation, knew from an early age that nursing was the path she wanted to take.
"I knew I always wanted to do something in health care," she says. "When I was little, I swore I wanted to be a veterinarian. But I decided on nursing as a serious occupation."
For many student-athletes, the challenge of balancing both academics and athletics is great, but in a major like nursing, those challenges are only amplified. Guenther figured out early on that the balancing act would be a tough one.
"It's tough at times, but it's doable," she says. "It helps that we get to schedule classes around our practice times. But you definitely have to get your priorities straight early and you can't always be that regular college student that goes out whenever they want. Sometimes you have to stay in on the weekends and it's tough at first adjusting, especially because we are on the road so much. But I adjusted pretty quickly."
With her time as a player now complete, Guenther is focusing on rehab and reaching her scheduled graduation in June 2011. She undoubtedly has one fan in her corner that has no doubt that she will be a success in the nursing field.
"With Julie, she puts 100% into everything," Sunahara says. "Whether she is in nursing or on the volleyball court, that's what she does."