Brown men’s club volleyball recently swept at the Division 1AAA National Championship, winning all ten games in three days to bring home the team’s first ever Nationals win. Co-captain Wesley Hackett ’26 was named a First Team All-Tournament selection, and co-captain Ohm Patel ’27 was named Tournament Most Valuable Player.
The win capped off a “really exciting season,” co-captain Luke Rossi ’26 said. “I think from the start, we kind of had a good idea that this was going to be a pretty strong team.”
In the fall preseason, the team hosted their first home tournament with several teams in New England and won, which Rossi said “set the tone” for the rest of the year. They also competed in the first ever Ivy League men’s volleyball tournament at Yale in October.
Despite losing that competition, the team had ample time in the spring semester to shoot for Nationals. The team ended with a regular season record of 7-2 and qualified for regionals, where they then advanced to Nationals.
Making it to Nationals was “the result of really hard practices all season long,” said Head Coach Sam Hillestad ’15, a former Herald opinions columnist. “We always knew that that was our goal, and so we really wanted to peak as a team in terms of our performance at Nationals.”
But it wasn’t all smooth sailing once they made it to the Kansas City competition, Rossi said. He noted that there were several matches where they “went down early” or “were either tied” or losing a little towards the end of some sets.
The second set against Yale on the second day “was the longest set of volleyball I’ve ever played in my life” said Rossi. After an arduous back-and-forth game, Bruno won 36-34.
“It’s easy to either lose energy or just lose focus or kind of doubt yourself,” Rossi said. “We were able to just have the confidence in ourselves to close out the games.”
In the final match, the team beat Illinois State 25-19, 25-23 to claim the trophy.
The men’s club volleyball team has two volunteer coaches, Hillestad and Assistant Head Coach Matt Lo ’18 ScM’19. Hillestad played on the team during his four years at Brown and was a captain for three years. He overlapped for one year with Lo, who played on the team for five years at Brown and was a captain for four.
A few years ago, Hillestad reached out offering to help coach the current team. He was happy to provide more “formal coaching” as they looked towards getting “more serious as a program.” Lo then joined the coaching staff.
“In my time playing, I wish we’d had a coach,” Hillestad said. “I was really happy to be able to help provide that experience that I wanted a little bit more when I was an undergrad.”
The coaches allowed the team “to come so much farther than we have been able to in any previous year,” Hackett said. “I would not be anywhere near the same player I am without the help of those two.”
Some players were “directly affected” by the Dec. 13 shooting, Lo wrote in an email to The Herald. “It felt like diving back into volleyball was a way to move on from what happened and return to being students and athletes again.”
Spencer Yang ’29, a starter on the team, was injured during the shooting. He said his biggest goal coming back to campus was returning to play.
At Nationals, Yang played the whole tournament. “Every day was fun because we were excited to play and excited to do better,” he said.
Hillestad feels that the team culture “really shows on the court in terms of camaraderie and communication, which are so important in volleyball in particular.”
Many of the players are “genuinely best friends,” Hillestad said, adding that they are a “really, really a tight knit group of guys.”
Rebecca Goodman is a university news senior staff writer covering career and alumni. She is a junior from Cambridge, MA, studying English. Outside of writing, you can find her at the Avon or in the basement of the Rock.
