Volleyball: Making successful programs no problem for Rens

When the Pitt women’s volleyball team hired a new head coach before last season, it knew what… When the Pitt women’s volleyball team hired a new head coach before last season, it knew what it was getting. Coach Toby Rens is more than a small-town kid now making noise as the volleyball coach of a big-city team. He’s a proven winner, a program builder and rebuilder.

Dramatic turnarounds are the norm for Rens.

His team found success this year by putting away opponents and playing an up-tempo game — both staples of Rens’ style.

But this season didn’t look so promising at the beginning of the year.

Going into the season, this year looked like a challenge. Five seniors, including four starters, were gone — the departed players were an important part of Pitt’s offensive production last season.

Consequently, the Panthers were picked to finish eighth in the Big East out of 15 teams in a preseason poll. That would put them just barely in the postseason Big East tournament.

The one thing Pitt didn’t need was panic, which certainly wouldn’t be provided by Rens.

“We knew going into it as a group that we were certainly capable of greater things than that,” Rens said about the preseason expectations. “That’s where it’s fun to enjoy the success. Enjoying the success has been very fulfilling because they’ve grown so much as a team.”

Last year, despite transitioning a Pitt team from a head coach leaving right before the season, Rens led Pitt to the Big East tournament and an upset win over Cincinnati in the first round.

But that was last year — a win over Cincinnati and a quick exit in the second round. This year, the Panthers want to sustain a run through the Big East Championship.Then comes the eventual goal of playing in the NCAA Tournament.

“I think it’d mean a lot [to earn a berth to the Tournament]. This group has worked exceptionally hard, they want it dearly,” Rens said. “No one on the team has tasted that as far as winning the Big East or going to the NCAAs. We still have a lot of volleyball ahead of us, but winning the Big East Championship is the easiest way for us to seal the deal.”

Rens wants to make the Panthers NCAA Tournament regulars, just as he has brought other teams he has coached into the Tournament.

Prior to Pitt, Rens established Long Island University as a perennial Northeast Conference power. Rens took the Blackbirds to Northeast Conference titles and automatic NCAA Tournament berths in each of his four seasons there. LIU averaged 26.5 victories a year under Rens, including a 32-7 mark in 2004, which is the winningest season in LIU history.

Before LIU, Rens was the head coach at the University of Maryland-Eastern Shore. There, he miraculously turned the program around. UMES went 3-28 during his first season, but skyrocketed to 20-15 the following year and earned a berth in the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference final.

For completing one of the biggest turnarounds in Division I volleyball, Rens was named the 2002 MEAC Coach of the Year.

Now it’s the Panthers year to turn around.

“I’m just really happy for this group to be in this type of position where they put so much hard work into developing as a team,” Rens said. “That to me is the really fulfilling thing as a coach.”

Rens grew up in a town of 700 people, he said, and learned to play volleyball by playing with one of his younger sisters, Trisha.

“We even created our own net and court from a clothes-line pole to a tree with rope,” he said. “We would pepper or shoot hoops until it got dark.”

Rens said his sister’s initial interest got him hooked on it. He played in high school, in a league similar to an AAU basketball league, and college, then became an assistant coach at his alma mater, Morningside College. What happened after is what brought Rens to Pitt.

Now, he enjoys watching his players improve and progress.

“Honestly, for me it’s all about the players. It’s been fun to see their success and to see the development of them as a team to see their confidence level grow week by week,” he said. “That’s the fulfilling thing as a coach, to see the growth collectively as a team to see the things worked on in practice come to fruition on the court in games.”