The back-and-forth exchanges between players didn’t sound great. The St. Raphael boys volleyball team sounded like a team in the midst of a crisis. One Saint stepped in and told his teammates to stop fighting and play.
Near the bench, Napoleon DeBarros set his teammate straight.
“It’s not fighting,” DeBarros explained. “We’re on the same football team. There’s a natural competitiveness.”
The chat was over as quickly as it started and St. Raphael went back to work as if it never happened. It’s not something you see from many volleyball teams, never mind one near the top of the Division III standings.
But the Saints aren’t your typical volleyball team.
The sport’s programs are built in similar fashion throughout the state. A club player here or there with part-time, multisport athletes filling out the rest of the roster. You get basketball players, track athletes, former tennis players who couldn’t crack the varsity or a former baseball player who couldn’t hit a curve.
This year for St. Raphael? It got football players.
Seven of them to be exact, five of whom see serious time on the court for a team that should be a contender for the Division III title.
“We just wanted to have fun,” said Andre DePina-Gray, a middle hitter for the volleyball team who recently committed to the University of Rhode Island to play football in the fall. “Volleyball is one of those sports you can have fun while you’re winning and it’s a good way, just like football, to get with your friends and make a lot of memories.”
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You see football players take part in other sports. They run track, wrestle, play basketball, fill a baseball team or continue to hit people in lacrosse. Volleyball and football don’t exactly go together.
That thinking changed with Moses Meus.
Meus is a 6-foot-3-inch, 220-pound junior who can jump higher and is faster than most people you know. He's an All-State defensive end and linebacker, plays basketball — you can catch him trying 360-degree dunks between volleyball sets — and last spring, a teammate recruited him to give volleyball a try.
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It turns out that being tall and able to jump through the roof is helpful on a volleyball court. He was a key player on a Saints team that reached the Division III finals. So this spring, he threw out his own recruiting pitch.
“We said if we didn’t win the [football] championship our senior year, we said we have to play volleyball,” DeBarros said. “As soon as we lost, [Meus] was like ‘volleyball season’ right away.”
“As soon as I saw Andre walk in, I was, like, OK. Then Napoleon walks in. Then [Henrique Ross]. Then Isaiah [Delgado],” St. Raphael coach Cory Linhares said. “I was, like, ‘OK, this is going to be something.’ ”
Volleyball was something they did at cookouts or gym class. Linhares was more than happy to figure out how to use their size and athleticism. It’s not hard to see why.
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DePina-Gray is the perfect example. He’s an All-State safety and, had he picked up volleyball when he was younger, he probably could have been an All-State outside hitter as well.
“Andre’s first game — he had 19 kills right off the rip and he’d only been playing for two weeks,” Linhares said. “You see that stuff instantly. The skills from other sports translate.”
DeBarros is a running back and safety now trying to become a consistent outside hitter. Ross is a running back and linebacker learning how to be a weak-side hitter and secondary setter. Delgado is a lineman and, while his vertical lift might not be that of his teammates, he comes up with a kill every now and then.
Against Burrillville, Delgado came up with one that put the Saints up, 19-15, in the fourth set and started getting roasted by his teammates about that being his first of the season.
He laughed and responded, “Hey, that’s got to be my second or third.”
While there is a lot of joking during matches, the Saints aren’t out there for fun. They’re trying to win a title.
Linhares puts his football players — and the rest of his team, most of whom are athletes in other sports — through a boot camp to get them to learn techniques instead of relying completely on athleticism.
“We’re trying to cram two, three, four years of volleyball for the older guys into three months,” Linhares said. “We’re trying to go hard every day, picking up those skills. They’re making the plays, but consistency is going to be a big thing for us.”
It matters because athleticism will only take you so far. Against Burrillville, Meus was the best athlete on the court. It didn’t matter against Burrillville middle blocker Mitchell Farrell, who penetrated the net and roofed Meus on several occasions.
An experienced middle hitter dinks around the block, but Meus tried to power through again and again and again. He laughed about it after the match, but like a football player breaking down film, he explained what he did wrong and how he needed to fix it.
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Meus, and the rest of the volleyball newbies, want to be coached because that’s what they’re accustomed to.
“One practice, [Linhares] came in and it was just dedicated to blocking the ball,” Meus said. “He came in, spiking it at us and our arms started getting red — but it was good work.”
Confidence is also key and that’s something the Saints are working on. There’s a slight hesitation, the type of uncertainty you don’t see from them on a football field. That’s expected with a new sport.
But every now and then the Saints don’t hesitate and something just clicks and they go from looking like first-year volleyball players to looking unstoppable.
“Even in [Thursday’s] game, a couple of swings, I was surprised at myself,” DePina-Gray said. “Usually, if I hit it with a ton of power, they usually just go flying out. Some that landed in, I was very surprised.”
“If I mess up, I’ll get down,” DeBarros said. “But just like football, I get a hit on the floor, I’ll come right back up.”
The football guys stick to the front row and give setter Jonah Venditto — a basketball player by trade — weapons to work with. Geronimo Idarraga, Devan Tavares (a freshman who was on the football team last fall) and Bryce Rodrigues fill spots in the back row and Kamill Suero is playing his part on the team as a versatile weakside hitter.
Just like a football team, a volleyball team can’t succeed with just one athlete. St. Raphael works because players are learning and competing for one another, all with one goal in mind.
“Win,” DePina-Gray said. “One game at a time.”
Volleyball was supposed to be just for fun for them, but it has infused competitive juices back into the football players’ bloodstreams. Now they’re closing their high school careers doing something they never could have imagined.
“Going into high school, you’ve got to do as many sports, clubs, whatever you can, because sooner or later, you’re going to be gone,” DeBarros said. “I wish I started my freshman year because as soon as we stepped on the court and started getting into things, it was very fun.”
“Not only is it fun to see them grow," Linhares said, "like when Andre makes the connection and hits the one and it’s a kill or Moses, when he gets up there and blocks — but they’re all great kids. They’re great kids to be around and they bring great energy to the practices and games and they’re just great fun.”
This article originally appeared on The Providence Journal: St. Raphael High volleyball team stars on football field last fall
