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Jan. 14, 2008

COLUMBIA, S.C. – The University of South Carolina added Laura Collins as an assistant coach on the women’s volleyball staff, Gamecock head coach Ben Somera announced on Tuesday. Collins, a former standout for Ben and former Carolina head coach Nancy Somera at Oregon State, will assist the Garnet and Black in all areas of training, recruiting and administration.

“I am excited to not only work with Laura again but to give one of my ex-players the opportunity to make volleyball a career,” said Somera. “Laura has great playing and coaching experience that will benefit our program in many ways. Having played for me at Oregon State, she will arrive in Columbia with a working knowledge of our systems and procedures in the gym which will get her up to speed very quickly.”

Collins still ranks third on the Beavers’ all-time assists chart with 3,786 and earned honorable mentions on the All-Pacific-10 team for three consecutive years. She stands as the only two-time Pac-10 Player of the Week honoree in Oregon State volleyball history. A two-year team captain, Collins also earned a spot on the ESPN The Magazine Academic All-District third team in 2002.

Since her 2004 graduation with a B.S. in marketing from Oregon State, Collins has coached on the high school, club and collegiate levels in Oregon. She spent six months as an assistant with the Canby Volleyball Club before working with Division III Pacific (Ore.) for the 2005 season. After a short stint with the Boxers, Collins returned to CVC as the head coach. In 2006 and 2007, she served as the head coach for Hillsboro (Ore.) High School.

“I am grateful for the opportunity to work with Ben again and be a part of the South Carolina volleyball program,” Collins said. “It’s exciting to be able to take the knowledge I gained at Oregon State as a player and now apply it as a coach. After only being in Columbia a short time, I can already see how passionate the coaching staff is about taking this program to the top.”

With the addition of Collins to the full-time staff, Shannon Pallardy will return to her graduate assistant role.

The Gamecocks being their spring training program with the start of classes this week and have one spring tournament scheduled for March 1 at Duke.