Ward thrived after fresh start

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This article was published 01/06/2021 (1679 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Kristine Ward is certainly glad she learned U Sports isn’t the be-all and end-all in volleyball.

The Elton product fought her way to the top of high school ball, winning two AA provincial championships before transferring to Neelin in 2012 and capturing a AAAA title. She saved her best for last, playing two of her finest matches in the final four in 2013, earning a provincial all-star award and garnering attention at the next level.

Ward didn’t have to look past her first choice and dream school, signing with the University of Regina.

Following two fun, fantastic years with the Neelin girls and coach Kevin Neufeld, however, she had to learn the hard way that not every situation is quite so positive.

“I just wasn’t loving it. There was quite a bit of, I wouldn’t say drama, but the change from Neuf to my coach at the U of R was quite negative of an atmosphere,” Ward said. “Being around that constantly was extremely tough on my mental health. I ended up making the decision that in the long run, this was not good for me. My grades weren’t going well, it was just not a very healthy situation.”

It wasn’t the transition to the Canada West game that got to her, or the demanding workload of post-secondary student-athletes. She’d been lifting weights multiple times a week and hitting the court almost every day for the past two years.

Ward was used to that. And she held her own coming off the bench as a rookie. The five-foot-10 outside hitter put up 32 kills with 40 errors, adding 16 digs in 18 matches in 2014-15, on a struggling 7-17 Cougars team trending in the wrong direction.

Ward stepped away at the semester break in 2015, following the team’s lone win of the season.

“Before I had even got there, there were multiple, multiple girls who quit halfway through a season because of the atmosphere,” Ward said. “Part of it was I would be dreading to go to practice. I didn’t want to go and would have such bad anxiety leading up to practice. Usually practice would be my outlet compared to the rest of my day.

“… (I was) starting to hate the game I love that got me here.”

In hindsight, she just needed a fresh start and got one.

Ward had competed with Saskatchewan’s provincial beach team at the 2015 Western Canada Summer Games and met now fiancé Dax Whitehead from the men’s team. They started dating in March of 2016 while he was making a name for himself at Lethbridge College in the Alberta Colleges Athletic Conference. (He’s currently second all-time in ACAC kills at 1,167.)

Ward said she hadn’t realized there was another post-secondary league available to her, but jumped at the chance to return to the court. She looked at a few schools and followed Whitehead to Lethbridge to take a two-year registered massage therapy diploma.

It felt right from the start, when her new teammates voted her as a co-captain before the 2016-17 season.

“The fact that they trusted me and recognized the leadership within me, I took a lot of pride in that,” Ward said.

“What I took from my team back home from Neelin … was that accountability you hold to each other, trying to teach my younger teammates that. The biggest part was trying to teach them it’s not just about how you play. The most important thing I’ve learned from volleyball is how to be a good person, how to work with someone on a team and how to bring your teammates up, not down, and also holding each other accountable.”

The previous season, the Kodiaks only won one match. They improved but still missed the playoffs at 6-18 her first year there, then made the breakthrough in 2017-18, going 14-10 and finishing sixth at provincials.

Ward put up an impressive 278 kills — fourth in the ACAC — at 3.12 kills per set (seventh), adding 43 aces (fourth) and 209 digs (18th). She led her team in each category, earning Kodiaks female athlete of the year honours to go with an all-conference selection.

“It was fun. Not gonna lie, it was nice to be able to not be on the bench. The difference from University of Regina to when I played here is when I got subbed in, it wasn’t necessarily to give me a chance … it was to remind older players there are younger kids here who could take your spot,” Ward said.

“When I came here I was that older player. I was given a lot of leeway to just play my game and if I was struggling that day, my coaches let me play and trusted me to play through that struggle. It helped rebuild that confidence I originally had those two final games of my high school career.

“… It showed in my stats that when you give a player confidence in their skills and trust in them … how much more they can play to their own abilities.”

Ward graduated and worked as a massage therapist for a year and still does part time. She realized she doesn’t see herself doing it forever, though, and went back to school last year. She’s two years into a philosophy degree at the University of Lethbridge and with motivation from major moments like George Floyd’s death and hate crimes over the past year and beyond, she plans to take the Law School Admission Test this summer to work for change.

Now a full seven years removed from Spartans volleyball, the team and lessons learned remain very much part of who she is today.

“It honestly shapes my everyday life, how I walk into a room, how I interact with people, how I approach my school work,” Ward said. “The most is I’ve spent a couple of years coaching club and a lot of the way I coach my own teams. I try to embody Kevin Neufeld when I do it.”

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