A few years removed from playing in the national championship with the Oregon volleyball team, Haley Jacob, 23, has eased into her new career at the professional level. The libero recently signed a three-year deal with Super League power Rabita Baku, who is coming off a bronze medal finish.
How did your signing with Rabita Baku initially happen?
“I pretty much had nothing to do with it. It was mostly my agent. He just sent video from the season last year and also talked about my previous experience at Oregon. They ended up being interested and I’m pretty pumped about it.”
What was your reaction to joining the team and Champions League?
“Playing with some of the best of the best, which I’m excited for. I know there’s a really good libero (Brenda Castillo) there, one of the top in the world, so it will be nice to learn from her. That will definitely help my game. I’m excited about Champions League.”
With a well known libero already set in place, what do you expect your role to be?
“I expect my role to be whatever they need me to be. I’m not sure that I’ll start, but whatever they need me to do, I’m pretty sure I’ll step in and help out.”
After signing with a powerhouse team like Rabita Baku, does your experience with Oregon and the Pac-12 become that much more valuable?
“For sure. Building off Oregon always helps because I had a lot of good people around me, a lot of competitive people and that’s what I’m expecting. When I get there, I’m expecting to be around a lot of competitive people that expect and want to win.”
How was the initial transition to the pro league?
“It’s not even necessarily the volleyball that’s the biggest transition, it’s going to this whole new place where you have to learn about the people you’re with, language barrier, the food and playing with people you’ve never played with. The volleyball is somewhat the same. All-in-all, it wasn’t really that bad.”
Oregon was recently awarded the No. 9 ranking for the 2014-2015 recruiting class. Your reaction?
“It’s really impressive that they’re ranked ninth. That’s special and it’s something that they should be very proud of. I got to see a lot of them play and they’re a good group. They’re fun to watch. Even the class after that looks like they’re going to be great, so they’re constantly improving, which is amazing. I’m excited to see what they can do. They should do great things.”
Last time we talked, you mentioned working with the Portland Timbers. How’d all that happen and is that something you’d consider doing in your near future?
“I don’t really know what my future holds. Right now, I’m just focusing on volleyball and I’m working with them (Timbers) as a promotions intern, but I don’t know exactly where I want to land. It’s definitely interesting to me, but I’m not really sure that’s what I want to pursue. To see everything they do, how things work with the Timbers, it’s been nice. I just don’t know if that’s the direction I want to go.”