Colorado University Athletics
Still Relatively New To Volleyball, Buffs Standout Abu Making Major Strides
March 08, 2017 | Volleyball
BOULDER — Very few athletes can say that in the first year of playing a sport, they started receiving Division 1 scholarship offers.
However, when Colorado sophomore Naghede Abu stepped onto a volleyball court for the first time as a junior in high school, letters from college coaches were quick to pour in.
Born in Nigeria — a country where most athletes are track or soccer stars — volleyball was not on Abu's radar growing up. At 14 years old, her family moved to Riverside, Calif., where people took notice of her staggering physical dominance. Standing 6-foot-4, Abu was playing at a basketball tournament when her soon-to-be club volleyball coach sought her out.
"He just said, 'You look like you jump high, you should give it a shot,'" Abu said as she explained her random entrance into the sport of volleyball. "I was like 'OK' and I just loved it."
Starting so late in a sport where many girls start playing early in their pre-teen years was overwhelming at first. While she was trying to piece together all the different parts of the game, nearly everyone on her club volleyball team had already received scholarship offers.
"At first I was like, 'Wow all these girls in little shorts,'" said Abu, describing her first reaction to her new sport. "But then like as you start playing it, it was very difficult. There's so much more that goes into moves. There are so many calculations and reading to do, especially in the collegiate level."
Abu picked up the sport fast as she started catching college coaches' eyes after playing in the Junior Olympic tournament. At first, the idea of playing collegiate volleyball came as a shock and she questioned the coach who sent her the first offer. In her head Abu was wondering if he was serious.
Turns out he was one of the many colleges coaches who were sure they wanted Abu's talent. She first committed to UCLA, but ended up decommitting and taking more recruiting visits. Unsure if a Southern California kid could take the cold, she hesitated about coming to Colorado.
But once she stepped foot on campus, she fell in love and left inspired to be a Buffalo.
Abu is now a sophomore middle-blocker for the Buffs — she will be a junior next season — and admits to the difficulty she still faces being relatively new to the game. Entering her fourth year in the sport, she still hasn't picked up on every little detail and relies heavily on her defensive skills.
"Everything about it was hard," said Abu. "I still can't pass or set or do anything really. I can block and hit, that's literally all I do."
But she does it very well. Abu looks like she has been playing the sport for years when displaying her defensive force at the net. She quickly made a powerful impact on the Buffaloes as a freshman. A total of 142 blocks placed her eighth in the Pac-12 rankings and broke CU's freshman season record. She came back even stronger last season, leading the conference in the most blocks in a single match with 15 against Portland State and earning honorable mention All-Pac-12 honors in the process.
"She's very young to the sport, but I don't think you can tell that now when you watch her play," said head volleyball coach Jesse Mahoney. "She's caught up very fast in playing alongside kids who have been playing 10 years in the sport as opposed to her four."
At first glance, it seems only right to dedicate Abu's early success to her natural physical talent. Yet, Abu easily jokes about her physique and how her body hasn't always been so natural to her. She thanks her time in the weight room and volleyball strength coach Chris Sheckler for helping her develop.
"She was just tall and lanky," said Sheckler regarding Abu's progression since freshman year. "Now she's still obviously tall — but her strength has gone up. She's got incredible upper and lower body strength for someone as tall as her."
Although Abu possesses all of the physical traits to be a good volleyball player, her good performances reach beyond her tall stature and long arm span. To put it simply she's a hard worker.
"I mean she just loves to train," Sheckler said. "She's fully invested and committed into the training process and that's a huge feather in the cap to her physical progress. She wouldn't have made as good of physical progress if she wasn't fully bought in and she is."
"I think Naghede has the potential to be special because of her work ethic," Mahoney said. "She has very high aspirations and high standards for herself and so she doesn't take any reps off, any practices off. … On top of that she has a really good mind and a she's very intellectually curious, trying to figure out how she could be a better player, a better teammate and just a better competitor."
Abu models her work ethic after her mother and after her sister, who is currently in medical school. She says they work hard and they go get what they want, which is what encourages her to master the relatively new sport every day and work hard to build upon the skill sets she already has.
"You know she just wants to be better. She wants to be as good as she can be," Mahoney said, regarding Abu's future at CU. "I think we haven't seen anything like what's she's going to be in her junior and senior year. There is still a large ceiling for her, she can still keep getting better."
SPRING SCHEDULE: The Buffs recently announced a five-match spring schedule, with three in Boulder. They will host Northern Colorado in an 11 a.m. match April 8 at the Coors Events Center, then face Colorado State in a 1 p.m. match the same day. They will play Colorado State again on April 15 in Fort Collins and Northern Colorado on April 21 in Greeley. The Buffs will wrap up their spring with a noon home match April 22 against Wyoming.
