After being tricked into trying out for her high school volleyball team, Nele Barber found a passion and became one of the Long Beach State women’s volleyball team’s best players.
Between gymnastics and karate, Barber always put volleyball on the back burner, until the coach called her father and said that she should try out for the team.
“My dad was telling me it was for gymnastics and I was like oh sure, gymnastics at the sports school, yeah,” Barber said. “So I went there and it was not for gymnastics. Everyone there was doing sprints or throwing balls and I was like…alright just go through it.”
Luckily for the 49ers, Barber decided to stick with volleyball and left balancing on beams and kicking boards behind.
The happy accident that got the outside hitter in the sport perfectly reveals her happy-go-lucky spirit and go-with-the-flow personality. The Berlin native embraces each moment with incredible enthusiasm, whether she is on the court or giving an interview.
At first blush, Barber comes across as immensely humble, but incredibly outgoing. Barber’s roommate, freshman middle blocker Doris Bogoje recalled the first meeting with her new teammate, where Barber immediately embraced her in a bear hug and exclaimed, “I’m your new roomie.”
“She has that first impression that people can love her,” Bogoje said. “The relationship between us stayed just like the first impression and we are really good friends now.”
Back in Germany, the junior recalled receiving an invitation every year from the volleyball coach at the Schul-und Leistungssportzentrum, the Berlin School and Competitive Sports Center.
In the beginning, she was one of the smallest players, but quickly grew into her current six-foot frame. With her past experience in gymnastics, Barber said she had the body control needed to compete in volleyball.
Barber said she must have done something right at the try-out since she made it into the school and on the team. Ever since then Barber has kept at the sport and continued to progress.
After high school, Barber had two options; either try to play professionally or go to school, but many professional clubs want the players to focus on the sport and not another activity. Over the summer after graduating high school, Barber played full time for a professional team, but wasn’t quite ready for volleyball to dominate her life.
Unlike most students who would rather do anything to avoid studying, Barber was willing to do anything to be able to go to school. She saw attending college as the best balance between volleyball and schoolwork.
Barber flew half way across the world to The States and began her collegiate career at Marquette University in Milwaukee. After two years, a coaching change and a harsh winter, Barber wanted to switch things up and saw LBSU as her best option.
“I love [Long Beach] so far,” Barber said. “Being here in California is like one statement, ‘You’re here in California, so you must be happy,’ and it’s kind of true.”
For LBSU head coach Brian Gimmillaro, it was Barber’s natural talent and style that attracted him to recruit her. Gimmillaro said that Barber is the kind of player that a coach wants to have on his team because of her spirit and her dedication.
“It’s never about her, it’s always about what she can do to help the team,” Gimmillaro said. “If you get six people like that, you’re going to win.”
Barber has exuberant confidence on the court, but is more focused on supporting her teammates. Bogoje said she has the talent of a star without feeling like she is superior to anyone.
In only five months of being a 49er, Barber has shown how valuable of a player she is, recording 12 double-doubles in 15 matches. Barber takes the top spot on LBSU in kills and digs, averaging 3.93 kills per set and 3.14 digs per set.
While Barber wasn’t ready to leave school and play volleyball professionally right after high school, it is still Gimmillaro’s intent to get her back to Germany.
“My goal is to get her to play on the German national team and to try and have her work to be a champion here,” Gimmillaro said. “I only have two years with her, I wish I had four.”
Barber said that once she started school, her vision of being a part of “Die Mannschaft” started to blur. But with the help of Coach Gimmillaro, her desire to represent her country is back on track.
“Once I’m done here, I want to go back and show them like ‘Hey, that’s what I can do, I can help you.’”
After not giving volleyball the time of day, Barber is now reaching for the highest level in the sport.
Barber confessed about the sport, “I could not imagine not doing it.”