Ole Miss’ Nakeyta Clair Selected to Collegiate National Team

Hard work pays off, because you never know when you might get that call. Rising Ole Miss volleyball senior Nakeyta Clair has been training hard during the offseason and this summer, and recently she received an invitation to join the Collegiate National Team Program next week in New Orleans, Louisiana, alongside some of the nation’s best players.

Nakeyta Clair Photo courtesy of Ole Miss Athletics

Clair (Country Club Hills, Illinois) will join teammate and rising junior Melanie Crow (Wildwood, Missouri), who was picked for the team earlier in the spring. Both participated in the U.S. Collegiate National Team tryouts in February.

Crow and Clair are among 36 athletes to participate in the U.S. Collegiate National Team (CNT) program that will train and compete in conjunction with the USA Volleyball Girls’ Junior National Championships from June 21-29 in New Orleans, La.

Rising junior Aubrey Edie was a member of the team last year and went on to set the single match and single season records for assists and was named to the AVCA All-South Region Team.

“This is a great opportunity for Nakeyta,” head coach Steven McRoberts said. “She has worked very hard over the offseason and summer, so I know that she is physically ready to go. She will get to practice and compete with some of the best college players in the nation, which will help her as she enters her senior season. It’s an honor for our program to have two players on the team.”

Clair earned the trifecta as a junior, becoming the second All-American in the history of the program, as well as grabbing AVCA All-Region honors and All-SEC honors. She set the single-season mark for kills with 366 and ranked among the nation’s top hitters with a .405 attack percentage.

This will be the fourth consecutive year for USA Volleyball to have its U.S. Collegiate National Team program (formerly known as U.S. Women’s National A2 Team) represented at the USAV Girls’ Junior National Championships.

For more information on Ole Miss Volleyball, follow the Rebels on Twitter at @OleMissVB, on Facebook at OleMissVolleyball and on Instagram at OleMissVB.

Courtesy of Ole Miss Athletics