Another BSM girls volleyball captain recently committed to a college. Senior captain Michaela Dooley will attend St. Olaf to continue her education and volleyball career.

Dooley is a homegrown Red Knight, as she has been in the volleyball program since 7th grade. She has enjoyed her time in the program and even considers it more fun than her club team. “It sounds cheesy, but it’s literally one of the best things. It’s kind of common for volleyball players my age to like club season a lot more than high school season, but I think if you asked any of my teammates, we love high school season. We’re all best friends, which is pretty unique,” Dooley said.

Dooley’s path to her commitment was unlike many others because her club coach and college coach Emily Foster was a large help in the process. Dooley was unsure about the idea of playing volleyball in college, but in August of 2022, she made up her mind. She started by communicating and emailing some colleges before Foster reached out. Foster is the coach at St. Olaf and recruited Dooley to come visit the campus. “I was super fortunate because my college coach was my club coach so as she reached out to me about my plan to stay home in like, March, so really early on, and I honestly did not think I would be playing at all so yeah, I was just super fortunate to kind of always have that offer there for me,” Dooley said.

After touring St. Olaf, Dooley became enamored with the school. The small town environment was just what Dooley was looking for. “The small town atmosphere and the volleyball team is super inviting… I really like the size and width and the actual campus was really, really pretty,” Dooley said.

Dooley’s future plans for volleyball after college are still unclear, but she hopes to possibly coach. “Yeah, I think I definitely could see myself like, I don’t know, coaching one day. I don’t know whether my kids would like [volleyball] someday because I ended up obviously loving doing that,” Dooley said.

Now that she has her college plans all figured out, she is mainly enjoying her final season playing as a Red Knight. “I’m just really excited to keep finishing High School,” Dooley said.