It’s not easy being Brooke Foster
9/15/2017 12:02:00 PM | Volleyball
The high-flying outside hitter, the first Montana recruit to touch 10 feet in maybe forever and the odds-on favorite to be the Big Sky Conference MVP in 2021, didn't want to play college volleyball.
And that was less than 18 months ago.
Here's what she did want: To be a regular college student and have the freedom and flexibility to do normal college-student things.
After playing the sport year-round since her freshman year, for the Boise Volleyball Club and Timberline High, Brooke Foster was ready to call it good once her senior season was complete, to put the sport behind her.
But she was so, so good. Better than she realized. And people took notice.
The first contact came when she was a sophomore, from Gonzaga, "and that kind of scared her," says her father. "She wasn't ready for that. She was intimidated by what she'd heard about how hard it was. Getting up at 6 a.m. to work out, not having time to do anything else."
That wasn't the college experience she wanted for herself.
David and Tracy Foster weren't going to push their oldest daughter to do something she didn't want to do, but they also knew it was their role as parents to guide her through the process and make sure she looked into all the options that might come her way.
Because once an opportunity to play Division I volleyball is turned down, once those years pass by, all of it is gone for good, never to be reclaimed, no matter how great the regret.
"All we asked was that she keep her options open. Reply to emails that come from coaches. Talk to them," says David.
"And we wanted her to take at least one visit. We were fine with her saying no, but she owed it to herself to at least find out what she was saying no to. We didn't want her to miss out on a really cool opportunity."
So she made that trip. To Montana during the summer before her senior year. That's when the light came on. Maybe this was what she wanted after all.
What she had pictured as drudgery -- endless weeks of training and lifting and meetings and traveling, with whatever daylight hours remained going toward schoolwork, all at the expense of, you know, actually enjoying her four years in college -- she now saw differently and in a new light.
Maybe it was the opportunity her parents had told her it could be. And at a school and city that felt like it could be a home away from home. For a program she fell in love with. So she gave her verbal commitment. "She was all in after that," says her dad.
With that decided, Foster played her way to 5A Southern Idaho Conference Player of the Year honors last fall and led her team to a runner-up finish at the state tournament.
Then it was all about playing at Montana, for the Grizzlies under first-year coach Allison Lawrence. Until it wasn't.
She arrived on campus in early August, went through two weeks of two-a-days and was a revelation at the team's intra-squad scrimmage, fitting right in with Montana's more experienced outside hitters with nine kills.
It was less than a week until the team would travel to North Texas for its season-opening tournament. Big things were just around the corner. The countdown was on.
She may have had her doubts about playing collegiately, but she never took a break during her high school years from becoming the best player she could be. All that time and dedication were about to be rewarded. She was less than a week away from being an actual college volleyball player.
After the scrimmage, when she met with the coaching staff, prepared as she was to hear all about how it planned to use her for the team's first weekend and the season beyond, everything she had built up in her mind came crashing down.
She was forced to confront something she had never even considered a possibility: redshirting. Not playing. A flood of questions rushed to mind: Did they not think she was good enough to play at this level? What had she done wrong? Had they lost faith in her, were they giving up on her?
"They pulled me into their office and said, What would you think if we redshirted you?" Foster recalls. "I wasn't expecting to have a lot of time on the court as a freshman, but I wasn't expecting to not play at all.
"The first thing that came out of my mouth was, 'Whatever is best for the team.' You want to say so much more, but in that moment, that's what you say because you know the decision has been made. I don't really remember the rest of the meeting."
She needed to retreat, to find some solid ground to stand on after having her world flipped upside down. This isn't what she had signed up for or agreed to. She was ready to contribute now, not four years after this one. Hadn't they seen the way she was playing?
In a daze, she made her way to her car. First came the tears, then came a call to her dad. "I told him, 'Cancel your flights. Cancel all your trips. I'm not playing,' " says Foster.
Lawrence played at Oregon State. She did not redshirt her freshman year, but she's been coaching long enough to know what it's like for a freshman to have to internalize the idea of putting everything on hold, especially when they've been blindsided by the possibility, as Foster was.
"For most freshmen, redshirting seems like a negative. They take it to mean that if they are not good enough to contribute right now, they must not be good enough in general, and none of that is true," Lawrence says.
No one was doubting Foster's talent or physical gifts. Sometimes it just comes down to numbers. And opportunities. And balancing out players throughout the classes for the benefit of all. It takes vision. And it's often something only the coaches can see. At least right away.
Outside hitter was going to be Montana's deepest position group in 2017. Foster's arrival only added to that depth.
There was Alexis Urbach, last year's top kills producer. Then there was Missy Huddleston and Cassie Laramee, who ranked second and third in kills last season behind Urbach. And Maddy Marshall, another outside hitter, had joined the team in Foster's freshman class.
There was only so much playing time to go around.
"When we looked at our roster, we thought, Is it worth it for Brooke to compete for playing time and maybe earn some here and there at the expense of a year of eligibility?" says Lawrence. "With our numbers, we felt we needed to spread those players out."
It took time -- and she's still working through it -- but once the initial shock and disappointment started to wear off, Foster, a freshman with the maturity of a senior, began to take in the big-picture view of the situation. And she is now able to admit that her game maybe wasn't totally college ready.
If all she had to do in a match was line up on the left side and attack, attack and attack some more, she would be fine, but the best outside hitters at the Division I level are the total package. They not only get it done at the net, they are an asset in the back row.
That scrimmage last month, when she looked right at home offensively? Foster had four reception errors. As she learned through those early weeks of practice, those serves come across the net a lot hotter and harder than they did at Timberline High.
And a team's success at the college level is based on serve-receive. Nothing good can follow without a positive first touch.
"The game is so different than playing in Boise. That's definitely my biggest flaw," Foster says. "It wasn't a problem for me in high school. The serves were easy, and that really hurt me when I came to college. Fall camp was really hard for me. Practices are still hard for me."
Lawrence has seen it before. A freshman is asked to redshirt, and they take the news and go into limbo. It's easy to understand why. A full season of practices, with no immediate reward? Players can start to coast, to go through the motions. I'll start putting in the extra effort next year, when I can actually play.
"A lot of players get complacent and put themselves in this holding pattern until their first active season," Lawrence says.
"They can get bogged down in the idea that they're just training and not playing, and that thought can become an obstacle for them, instead of, okay, I have all this time to train and get ready for this distant goal. That's what I love about how Brooke is approaching it."
Go to one of the team's practices these days, and there will be Foster after the final drill, after the rest of the players have left, asking for extra reps from her coaches. If they are not available, she'll find a wall. Pass, pass, pass. Improve, improve, improve. All while visualizing successful days ahead.
Earlier this season, Foster was given a list of personal questions to answer. One wondered whether she'd take one wish today or pass that up for three wishes 10 years from now. It was an easy answer.
"Brooke has shown she is someone who is willing to delay gratification and keep the big picture in mind for this long-term goal," says Lawrence. "That's why I think this year is going to be so beneficial."
Montana plays this weekend at Southern Illinois-Edwardsville's tournament. Next week: the start of Big Sky Conference play. It's been well over a month since the team's first practice and weeks since Foster learned she was going to redshirt.
The season is flying by, and future autumns are filled with even more promise under Lawrence and her two assistants, Giedre Tarnauskaite and Dana Cranston. There have been breakthroughs already this season, and the staff and program are only getting started.
That's what has most sustained Foster in the early weeks of her redshirt season. Not only is she going to get better this season and keep improving every year after that, she is going to be playing on teams that are only going to get stronger and stronger. And that's pretty intoxicating.
"If I didn't have confidence in the program and where it's headed, redshirting would be so much harder," Foster says. "I know we're only going to get better and better under Allison, Gie and Dana, and that makes it a lot easier for me to look to the future."
And there is another element to redshirting, one that takes a leap of faith. A player might not know it, but these will likely be the best years of her life.
A fifth year -- or maybe just one extra fall semester -- might seem like a distant milepost, one a freshman may not be interested in reaching. That's where trust has to come into play for someone who joined the program with four years on her mind, then forced to recalibrate.
"I can relate to that thought. I remember how long a four-year career felt when I was a freshman. Adding a fifth year can feel a little bit daunting. It can feel like an eternity," says Lawrence. "But I don't know of a lot of athletes who, when it's over, wouldn't want a little more of this time in their life.
"Redshirts can't possibly know what it feels like to be at the end of this path, but when it ends, it feels incredibly short. There is no way to make them feel that as freshmen. You kind of have to ask for their trust. At the end, there is never enough time, so having a little more time is a gift."
Foster can see and appreciate the longer view. At least most of the time. Some days she wants it now.
"It's a rollercoaster ride. Some days I'm excited for the future and that's all I can think about. And some days I'm frustrated that I'm putting in so much work and I have to wait for that reward to come," she says.
For now she practices and lives the life of an active first-year player vicariously through her fellow freshmen. Maddy Marshall and Baily Permann are both playing key roles this fall.
"It's hard watching the other freshmen get playing time. It's hard putting in all the work and not getting the reward that they're getting," she says. "When I see Maddy get a kill, I'm so happy for her, but inside I'm like, that could have been me, and you can't help but be frustrated by that.
"So I'm living through Maddy at the moment while putting a lot of trust in the process. Next year."
The most influential people for Foster in high school were her English teachers. It's why she wants to follow in their footsteps and fill that same role for future generations of students.
"I want to have that same impact on them at that time, when life can get hard and you have a lot of hard decisions to make," Foster says.
Who better to help guide someone down that sometimes rocky path than someone who's gone down it before? Sure, Brooke Foster has slipped and lost her footing from time to time, but she's still upright, moving forward confidently toward the even better days she knows are ahead.
And that was less than 18 months ago.
Here's what she did want: To be a regular college student and have the freedom and flexibility to do normal college-student things.
After playing the sport year-round since her freshman year, for the Boise Volleyball Club and Timberline High, Brooke Foster was ready to call it good once her senior season was complete, to put the sport behind her.
But she was so, so good. Better than she realized. And people took notice.
The first contact came when she was a sophomore, from Gonzaga, "and that kind of scared her," says her father. "She wasn't ready for that. She was intimidated by what she'd heard about how hard it was. Getting up at 6 a.m. to work out, not having time to do anything else."
That wasn't the college experience she wanted for herself.
David and Tracy Foster weren't going to push their oldest daughter to do something she didn't want to do, but they also knew it was their role as parents to guide her through the process and make sure she looked into all the options that might come her way.
Because once an opportunity to play Division I volleyball is turned down, once those years pass by, all of it is gone for good, never to be reclaimed, no matter how great the regret.
"All we asked was that she keep her options open. Reply to emails that come from coaches. Talk to them," says David.
"And we wanted her to take at least one visit. We were fine with her saying no, but she owed it to herself to at least find out what she was saying no to. We didn't want her to miss out on a really cool opportunity."
So she made that trip. To Montana during the summer before her senior year. That's when the light came on. Maybe this was what she wanted after all.
What she had pictured as drudgery -- endless weeks of training and lifting and meetings and traveling, with whatever daylight hours remained going toward schoolwork, all at the expense of, you know, actually enjoying her four years in college -- she now saw differently and in a new light.
Maybe it was the opportunity her parents had told her it could be. And at a school and city that felt like it could be a home away from home. For a program she fell in love with. So she gave her verbal commitment. "She was all in after that," says her dad.
With that decided, Foster played her way to 5A Southern Idaho Conference Player of the Year honors last fall and led her team to a runner-up finish at the state tournament.
Then it was all about playing at Montana, for the Grizzlies under first-year coach Allison Lawrence. Until it wasn't.
She arrived on campus in early August, went through two weeks of two-a-days and was a revelation at the team's intra-squad scrimmage, fitting right in with Montana's more experienced outside hitters with nine kills.
It was less than a week until the team would travel to North Texas for its season-opening tournament. Big things were just around the corner. The countdown was on.
She may have had her doubts about playing collegiately, but she never took a break during her high school years from becoming the best player she could be. All that time and dedication were about to be rewarded. She was less than a week away from being an actual college volleyball player.
After the scrimmage, when she met with the coaching staff, prepared as she was to hear all about how it planned to use her for the team's first weekend and the season beyond, everything she had built up in her mind came crashing down.
She was forced to confront something she had never even considered a possibility: redshirting. Not playing. A flood of questions rushed to mind: Did they not think she was good enough to play at this level? What had she done wrong? Had they lost faith in her, were they giving up on her?
"They pulled me into their office and said, What would you think if we redshirted you?" Foster recalls. "I wasn't expecting to have a lot of time on the court as a freshman, but I wasn't expecting to not play at all.
"The first thing that came out of my mouth was, 'Whatever is best for the team.' You want to say so much more, but in that moment, that's what you say because you know the decision has been made. I don't really remember the rest of the meeting."
She needed to retreat, to find some solid ground to stand on after having her world flipped upside down. This isn't what she had signed up for or agreed to. She was ready to contribute now, not four years after this one. Hadn't they seen the way she was playing?
In a daze, she made her way to her car. First came the tears, then came a call to her dad. "I told him, 'Cancel your flights. Cancel all your trips. I'm not playing,' " says Foster.
Lawrence played at Oregon State. She did not redshirt her freshman year, but she's been coaching long enough to know what it's like for a freshman to have to internalize the idea of putting everything on hold, especially when they've been blindsided by the possibility, as Foster was.
"For most freshmen, redshirting seems like a negative. They take it to mean that if they are not good enough to contribute right now, they must not be good enough in general, and none of that is true," Lawrence says.
No one was doubting Foster's talent or physical gifts. Sometimes it just comes down to numbers. And opportunities. And balancing out players throughout the classes for the benefit of all. It takes vision. And it's often something only the coaches can see. At least right away.
Outside hitter was going to be Montana's deepest position group in 2017. Foster's arrival only added to that depth.
There was Alexis Urbach, last year's top kills producer. Then there was Missy Huddleston and Cassie Laramee, who ranked second and third in kills last season behind Urbach. And Maddy Marshall, another outside hitter, had joined the team in Foster's freshman class.
There was only so much playing time to go around.
"When we looked at our roster, we thought, Is it worth it for Brooke to compete for playing time and maybe earn some here and there at the expense of a year of eligibility?" says Lawrence. "With our numbers, we felt we needed to spread those players out."
It took time -- and she's still working through it -- but once the initial shock and disappointment started to wear off, Foster, a freshman with the maturity of a senior, began to take in the big-picture view of the situation. And she is now able to admit that her game maybe wasn't totally college ready.
If all she had to do in a match was line up on the left side and attack, attack and attack some more, she would be fine, but the best outside hitters at the Division I level are the total package. They not only get it done at the net, they are an asset in the back row.
That scrimmage last month, when she looked right at home offensively? Foster had four reception errors. As she learned through those early weeks of practice, those serves come across the net a lot hotter and harder than they did at Timberline High.
And a team's success at the college level is based on serve-receive. Nothing good can follow without a positive first touch.
"The game is so different than playing in Boise. That's definitely my biggest flaw," Foster says. "It wasn't a problem for me in high school. The serves were easy, and that really hurt me when I came to college. Fall camp was really hard for me. Practices are still hard for me."
Lawrence has seen it before. A freshman is asked to redshirt, and they take the news and go into limbo. It's easy to understand why. A full season of practices, with no immediate reward? Players can start to coast, to go through the motions. I'll start putting in the extra effort next year, when I can actually play.
"A lot of players get complacent and put themselves in this holding pattern until their first active season," Lawrence says.
"They can get bogged down in the idea that they're just training and not playing, and that thought can become an obstacle for them, instead of, okay, I have all this time to train and get ready for this distant goal. That's what I love about how Brooke is approaching it."
Go to one of the team's practices these days, and there will be Foster after the final drill, after the rest of the players have left, asking for extra reps from her coaches. If they are not available, she'll find a wall. Pass, pass, pass. Improve, improve, improve. All while visualizing successful days ahead.
Earlier this season, Foster was given a list of personal questions to answer. One wondered whether she'd take one wish today or pass that up for three wishes 10 years from now. It was an easy answer.
"Brooke has shown she is someone who is willing to delay gratification and keep the big picture in mind for this long-term goal," says Lawrence. "That's why I think this year is going to be so beneficial."
Montana plays this weekend at Southern Illinois-Edwardsville's tournament. Next week: the start of Big Sky Conference play. It's been well over a month since the team's first practice and weeks since Foster learned she was going to redshirt.
The season is flying by, and future autumns are filled with even more promise under Lawrence and her two assistants, Giedre Tarnauskaite and Dana Cranston. There have been breakthroughs already this season, and the staff and program are only getting started.
That's what has most sustained Foster in the early weeks of her redshirt season. Not only is she going to get better this season and keep improving every year after that, she is going to be playing on teams that are only going to get stronger and stronger. And that's pretty intoxicating.
"If I didn't have confidence in the program and where it's headed, redshirting would be so much harder," Foster says. "I know we're only going to get better and better under Allison, Gie and Dana, and that makes it a lot easier for me to look to the future."
And there is another element to redshirting, one that takes a leap of faith. A player might not know it, but these will likely be the best years of her life.
A fifth year -- or maybe just one extra fall semester -- might seem like a distant milepost, one a freshman may not be interested in reaching. That's where trust has to come into play for someone who joined the program with four years on her mind, then forced to recalibrate.
"I can relate to that thought. I remember how long a four-year career felt when I was a freshman. Adding a fifth year can feel a little bit daunting. It can feel like an eternity," says Lawrence. "But I don't know of a lot of athletes who, when it's over, wouldn't want a little more of this time in their life.
"Redshirts can't possibly know what it feels like to be at the end of this path, but when it ends, it feels incredibly short. There is no way to make them feel that as freshmen. You kind of have to ask for their trust. At the end, there is never enough time, so having a little more time is a gift."
Foster can see and appreciate the longer view. At least most of the time. Some days she wants it now.
"It's a rollercoaster ride. Some days I'm excited for the future and that's all I can think about. And some days I'm frustrated that I'm putting in so much work and I have to wait for that reward to come," she says.
For now she practices and lives the life of an active first-year player vicariously through her fellow freshmen. Maddy Marshall and Baily Permann are both playing key roles this fall.
"It's hard watching the other freshmen get playing time. It's hard putting in all the work and not getting the reward that they're getting," she says. "When I see Maddy get a kill, I'm so happy for her, but inside I'm like, that could have been me, and you can't help but be frustrated by that.
"So I'm living through Maddy at the moment while putting a lot of trust in the process. Next year."
The most influential people for Foster in high school were her English teachers. It's why she wants to follow in their footsteps and fill that same role for future generations of students.
"I want to have that same impact on them at that time, when life can get hard and you have a lot of hard decisions to make," Foster says.
Who better to help guide someone down that sometimes rocky path than someone who's gone down it before? Sure, Brooke Foster has slipped and lost her footing from time to time, but she's still upright, moving forward confidently toward the even better days she knows are ahead.
Players Mentioned
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