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WSU volleyball hires new head coach

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By Kyle Nagel, Staff Writer Updated 9:10 AM Friday, January 20, 2012

FAIRBORN — Susan Clements asked for a brief pause in the conversation.

“Sorry,” Clements said after phone adjustment sounds. “In New York, you have to have hands-free when you’re driving.”

That’s just one of the changes Clements and the Wright State volleyball program will experience in the coming months. Clements, most recently the head coach at Niagara, was named the new WSU head volleyball coach Tuesday, becoming the fifth coach in the program’s history, replacing Trina Smith (2005-11).

Clements will take on a project at WSU, which finished 6-23 last season and seventh in the Horizon League at 5-11. WSU hasn’t produced a winning season since 2003 (16-15).

“I had a lot of kids at Niagara from Ohio, and I thought I could draw on the area to Wright State,” Clements said. “It’s like what happened at Niagara, with a department that wants to push forward, plus a bigger conference.”

Niagara set a school record for regular-season wins (23) while tying the mark in overall wins (25) last season, a high climb from the 8-19 and 6-24 records of Clements’ first two seasons there. In five seasons at Niagara, her teams went 87-70.

The foundation for a coaching career came from her family. She played a season of college volleyball at Bluefield College in Bluefield, Va., where her mother was the coach and her sister was a senior. After a season, she transferred to Georgetown (Ky.) College, where she was a two-time NAIA first-team All-American.

She became an assistant coach at Georgetown in 2004 for one season before serving as head coach there from 2005-06, during which her teams went 74-25.

Her teams’ reputations?

“We’ve always had really good defensive teams, maybe not tall but fast and scrappy, pass and serve and dig,” she said. “We’re built around that, and it helped our players get better.”

Chart-climbing: Senior forward Molly Fox enters Saturday’s road game against Detroit with a chance to finish the season in the top three in Raiders history in both points and rebounds.

Fox, who averages 13.9 points and 9.6 rebounds per game, ranks eighth in the WSU career scoring list (1,138) and fourth on the rebounding list (717). The rebounding record is 897, set by Lori Collins from 1991-95, and Fox will almost surely pass third-place Nettie Carter (756, 1984-88) in the next few games.

WSU’s all-time leading scorer is Jodi Martin (2,055 points, 1979-83), but with strong performances Fox has a chance to reach third-place Brittney Whiteside (1,413 points, 2003-07).

Fox is the only men’s or women’s basketball player at Wright State who has been with the program for more than one season.

Spring sports in January: The WSU baseball and softball teams have started practices in preparing for their season openers, Feb. 17 against Monmouth for baseball and Feb. 10 against Bowling Green for softball.

Contact this reporter at (937) 225-7389 or knagel@DaytonDailyNews.com.

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