Volleyball's Jordan Jones Hoping Nickname Will Come to Fruition Again This Season
By Mark Maloney, MSUEagles.com
Daylight hours are growing shorter and temperatures are beginning to drop. So it can't be long until that "most wonderful time of the year."
Jovember.
"Jovember" is a pet name for Morehead State volleyball player Jordan Jones. A 6-foot-3 junior, Jones seems to save her best for November.
That's a good thing, since that's when the Ohio Valley Conference and NCAA tournaments roll around.
Coach Jaime Gordon coined Jones' nickname.
"It was her freshman year and she'd been kind of going through some ups and downs, trying to figure out stuff, and we had just our first practice in the month of November," Gordon said. "And it was like a light switch went off. She was ripping the ball. And I said, 'Oh, my gosh, it's Jovember!'"
Jones ranks as a most versatile Eagle, splitting time between setter and right-side hitter.
"She's a pretty well-rounded player and it's a difficult task because, traditionally, your setters – that's what they focus on with all their reps in practice," Gordon said. "An attacker is doing a similar thing, where they can kind of focus on this component of their game. But when you've got to put on different hats at different times during the match, even during the preparation, it takes a lot of work."
Jones has five double-doubles (kills and assists) this season. Her season bests include 20 kills versus Jacksonville State, 36 assists against Savannah State and 13 digs versus Middle Tennessee State. She also has 16 aces.
Jones says she doesn't think of alternating between setter and attacker as a challenge.
"But I definitely have to rely on my teammates to help me do well in those roles," she said. "Because I can't get a good set without a good pass. I can't get a good hit without a good set, and a good pass before that."
Jones came to MSU from Blythewood, S.C., which is about a 20-minute drive from Columbia.
A biomedical sciences major, Jones would like to follow her time at Morehead by going to pharmacy school at the University of South Carolina. Carolina where she began playing volleyball as a fifth-grade defensive specialist.
She first caught Gordon's attention at an AAU National Championships in Orlando, Fla.
"She was brought up to an older age group, to step in for an injury that they had had," Gordon said. "And I was just really impressed with how this younger person showed such good composure and, even though she was still a little green in her game, her athleticism and her approach and her competitiveness really stood out."
Gordon built a relationship with Jones, which led to a trip to Morehead.
"I came on my visit. I loved the campus. I loved the community. I loved the family that the team was," Jones said. "And none of that's changed. It's exactly how I thought it was going to be."
As a freshman, Jones had 66 kills and was second on the team with 396 assists.
Last year, she again was second on the team in assists, 366, and was third in kills, 183. She earned second-team All-Ohio Valley Conference honors.
She says her biggest strides since becoming an Eagle have come in consistency and in relating to teammates.
"I used to be more of a lone player," Jones said. "If I saw something, I would say it to myself. But now I'm talking more to my teammates about what's happening on the other side of the court so we can all benefit from that. I probably need to improve on that, too, even more so. And just improve around the court. There's always room for improvement everywhere."
MSU certainly has room for improvement. The Eagles (10-9, 1-5 OVC) have dropped their last three matches. The Eagles will have home-court advantage this weekend, hosting Eastern Illinois (9-9, 3-3) Friday night at 7 p.m., and Southern Illinois Edwardsville (14-4, 4-2) Saturday afternoon at 2.
"The preseason tournaments, they went really well. We were 2-1 on three of them and then went 3-0 on the last one," Jones said. "I think that gave us confidence going into this season. But somewhere along the way I think we got a little bit – not scared, but a little bit anxious.
"'Oh, these games really do matter now that it's conference,' and almost a 'we can't lose' instead of 'I want to win.' … We weren't playing as free as we had been. And I think that last weekend in our Murray game, we played free. It was our best match performance-wise that we've lost this season, and I'm excited. I think that if we can continue to play that way that we can just keep going with the season and turn it around."
Just in time to set the table – for Jovember.
