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Wildcats’ Coach Wrather Heads Motiv8 Men’s Volleyball Podcast

9/21/2020 3:58:00 PM

By: Chris Myers
FORT VALLEY, Ga. – For others to be aware of an issue or organization, one has to get noticed. Fort Valley State's new head volleyball coach Larry Wrather and a group of six other black men's volleyball coaches across the college landscape have come together for the new Motiv8 Men's Volleyball podcast.
 
Wrather and his national coaches group of came together in attempt to bring exposure and awareness to black men's volleyball student-athletes in a white dominated sport.
 
The Wildcats head coach is joined by two other college head coaches in Purdue Fort Wayne's Ryan Perrotte and Nickie Sanlin of McKendree University. Four black men's volleyball assistant coaches round out the podcast group including Wrather's father and new FVSU assistant coach Edward Wrather, Josh Walker of the University of Hawaii, New York University's Karl France and Theo Edwards from Cal State Northridge.
 
The Motiv8 MVB podcast is released every other Sunday. Everyone can listen to it on either Spotify at: https://open.spotify.com/show/1Sha2sa80E6DNzpYr4qfFl?si=-rXhIbQmTGadshzMYq5-pg or Sounder at: https://motiv8.sounder.fm/
 
"The podcasts are intended to be educational and informational to help black males, who play volleyball or are interested in playing it. These are also to help white allies figure out how to help (their black counterparts) and spot systematic things in the volleyball world," explains Wrather.
 
The Motiv8 MVB coaches group wants to guide black student-athletes into the men's volleyball world and grow the overall men's volleyball sport. Currently, there are only 60 NCAA Division I and II combined men's volleyball programs. The inaugural all Historical Black College and University Conference will be started in the spring of 2022 by Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Conference.
 
"When I played at Ball State, we had three black student-athletes on our team my senior year (2014) and now it only has two. Many college teams have only one black athlete on their teams," explained Wrather. "We are, though, seeing more growth at tournaments instead of only one black player on a team, we are seeing two or three now, but, overall, it is a completely untapped pool of talent."
 
The Motiv8 MVB group also wants to grow the number of black student-athletes and the men's volleyball game, as a whole, to potentially help be a part in helping to bring a professional league to the United States with the only current options to play professionally being overseas.
 
"We will take any network or stream to get more interest and spike this interest in both black student-athletes playing and men's volleyball overall. Anything we can do to get 'over the hump' we have to get over," added the Wildcats head coach. "For it to get big, we will work as long as it takes to help get the word out and make people feel welcomed. So, we are doing the podcast, not as much for the recognition, but for the knowledge we want others to be gained from it."
 
With a talented group of black collegiate coaches around the country, Wrather and the Motiv8 MVB podcast group have the vision, leadership and experience to bring about the exposure and direction to the men's volleyball game. So tune in to their podcasts and help grow the interest and sport.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
-Wildcats-
 
 
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