On August 29, the Varsity Volleyball team went up against Armwood High School. The knights won 3-0. With every head-butt, shove and pass, new Coach Katrina Clay’s face would light up. Clay coached through the team’s highs and lows of the game, as if she was on the court, playing beside the team.
Clay is from Virginia, moving to Tampa for the sake of her husband’s career. Clay only began her journey as a coach in late 2023, as a volunteer coach for Robinson.
“I’ve played volleyball for about 15 years, but this is my first-year coaching in high school,” said Clay. “We moved here from Virginia, about a year ago. My husband is in the military. [I coach here because] my daughter goes here, and it’s right around the corner.”
Although the teams’ last coach left some big shoes to fill, the players believe in the direction that Clay is pointing the team in.
“My last coach, Coach Kylee, was very determined and dedicated to the program. She pretty much built this program up,” Haidyn Spano (’25), Varsity Captain of the Volleyball team said. “Now we have a new coach, Coach Clay, and working with her has been great. She has great energy and tends to be pretty involved and hyped for the season.”
The team started preseason-practice all the way back in June. The intense nature of both the conditioning and practices exemplify Clay’s high expectations for the players on the JV and Varsity teams.
“We started conditioning in the summer about twice a week. They were definitely strenuous at times, but were very good for our players,” Spano said. “We practice every day. I’d say they are both instructional and effective, whether it is in preparation to compete against other teams or working individually and building our toolbox.”
Unlike the last school her daughter attended in Virginia, Robinson spoke out to Clay as having an extreme amount of passion and pride on-campus.
“Everybody that goes to school here, I feel like loves their school. There’s a lot of pride in this school, and I wanted to be part of that. There’s a lot of passion and a lot of community,” Clay said.
With the backing of a well-trained team and a supportive campus, both Varsity and JV have been able to find relative success on the court.
“[Varsity] won against Freedom on Monday. Then we took Newsome to five and we took Wharton to four. And our JV is two in a row, they’re undefeated,” Clay said.
On the road to States, both teams face another month of games. As if she was on the court with her athletes, Clay is extremely passionate over the success that the team will see this season and is determined that the Knights will see a winning season on the court.
“We’re going to the State Championships. That’s what we’re doing, duh,” Clay said. “That is my goal, and that’s where we’re going. It’s tunnel vision. Tunnel vision.”
