Faith Academy announces volleyball coaching staff
CAPTION: Jay (left) and Rebekah (right) Silvers and their son Landon (second from left) and daughter Kerrington. Courtesy photo
Faith Academy of Marble Falls didn’t look too far for its next high school volleyball staff.
Athletic director Zakk Revell announced Rebekah Silvers as its new volleyball head coach and Emma Lewis as the assistant coach. Silvers is Faith’s director of academics and elementary principal and Lewis is the Student Life assistant and the junior high girls basketball coach at the academy.
“First off, we’re excited for this season and this team,” he said.
He noted that Silvers was lead assistant of the Lady Flames softball team when the sport was offered around Covid 19.
“And so she’s coached a lot,” the athletic director said. “And then obviously she was an athlete and has been around sports her whole life.”
She is the mother of senior outside hitter Kerrington Silvers and Landon Silvers, who is a standout football and track athlete and the wife of football head coach Jay Silvers.
Erin Sawyer had resigned as the volleyball head coach early in the summer and the job had been posted for several weeks. Finally Rebekah Silvers approached the athletic director.
“It kind of started as a conversation, kind of started with ‘we’re kind of late in the game. Who could do this?'” Revelle said. “And not just ‘can we just go snag somebody,’ but like ‘who could do it well and who really knows these girls?’ We also understood that this team is a pretty good team. (Former head coach Erin) Sawyer did an incredible job of coaching them up to this point and you bring back a lot of kids from last year’s team.”
Indeed. The Lady Flames return perhaps the Highland Lakes best outside hitter in junior Ella Claiborne, junior setter Olivia Kraenzel and the younger Silvers, who will be a senior.
“We felt like with all the returners that coach Silvers would be a really good option to do this,” the athletic director said. “Really what it came down to more than anything was just did she have enough time to do it with her other jobs as the director of academics?”
Revelle summed up what Lewis, a member of the 2018-19 Burnet High School girls basketball team that advanced to the Class 4A state tournament, joining the program means.
“We felt like that was a really big get just as much as it was to get coach Silvers,” he said. “And we’re obviously excited about our team, but then also really excited about the staff and their ability to pour into and hopefully help these young ladies grow as young women just as much as volleyball players. And so we look forward to having them lead our volleyball program.”
Revelle commended Sawyer for giving the players a solid foundation when it came to the basics and fundamentals of the sport.
“We’re so thankful for coach Sawyer and everything she did to build up our volleyball program to what it is,” he said. “Really going from somewhat of an unknown commodity to a very known commodity, and so we obviously appreciate and love her for that. A lot of credit to coach Sawyer in the way in which she built the volleyball program to where it is. There’s always something to be learned at every level for any athlete for any sport. A big piece of it came down to who can get a lot out of (the Lady Flames) and who can love them well and isn’t going to come in and try and demand this totally new thing? It was easy for us whenever those names got thrown in the hat with coach Silvers and with coach Lewis that these ladies know our girls better than anybody. A big part of that played into the decision making and had a lot to do with who can just hold this thing together.”
Faith will begin practices next week in preparation for the season opener at Llano Monday, Aug. 10, with the junior varsity playing at 5 p.m. and the varsity at 6 p.m.
CAPTION: Faith Academy Junior High girls basketball players with coach Emma Lewis (center). Courtesy photo
