Hannah Johnson and Minnesota Duluth seemingly have been on a collision course for some time.
Since the time her older brother, Adam, played football for the Bulldogs to the time she attended volleyball camps on the Duluth campus and later played on an all-star team under a UMD assistant coach, the Greenway senior has visualized what she would look like in maroon and white.
That moment will come soon enough. The 6-foot outside-middle hitter has made an oral commitment to attend UMD in the 2008-09 season. She'll sign a letter of intent in November.
That commitment was cemented when she made a pair of visits to the university and read a News Tribune column calling UMD's program a "dynasty." Furthering its appeal is the fact that the campus is only 90 minutes from Coleraine.
"The girls were really nice," Johnson said. "They have had a lot of success over the years, and since it was so close it was a dream come true. Being so close to home, my parents can come anytime."
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Johnson had an "in" with the program, having been coached for two years on an all-star Junior Olympic team coached by UMD assistant Christyn May.
"Having Christyn coach me, that was a head start," she said. "Now when I get to UMD, I'll know a lot of the players."
Johnson's reputation as a hard hitter likely will precede her appearance on campus. A starter since ninth grade, Johnson leads the Northland with 5.4 kills per game. She's often Greenway's first, second and third option on offense as she showed Tuesday with 36 kills in four games against Eveleth-Gilbert.
"She's got that killer instinct that you want in a hitter," Greenway coach Rhaya Tomberlin-Anderson said. "Some teams try to triple block her."
As a sixth-grader, Johnson was part of Tomberlin-Anderson's first Greenway summer volleyball camp. At the time, she sprayed her shots all around the court. Still, Tomberlin-Anderson knew the future was promising.
"She had all this power and didn't know what to do with it," she said. "You just knew, even as a sixth- and seventh-grader, she was going to be an excellent hitter."
Johnson honed that power during visits to UMD camps before her sophomore and junior years. She saw first-hand what it takes to play at the Division II level.
"I'd go to those UMD camps and see those girls hit the ball so hard, and I was like, 'I want to do that,'" she said. "It looked like a lot of fun."
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Greenway has used her as a middle hitter because of a lack of overall team height, but Johnson's at her best on the outside. Teammates are confident to set her -- no matter where she is on the court.
"She can always put it away at the time when you need it," senior libero Sam Frings said. "It's really nice to have that because you want someone to look to when you are down."
Opponents are quick to focus on Johnson. Coaches want their setters to keep the ball away from her side and make sure to commit enough blocking help when she is hitting.
"You definitely have to key on her," said Hermantown coach Sue Wasbotten, whose team has faced the Raiders twice in the past two-and-a-half weeks and could meet them again in the Section 7AA playoffs. "You have to make sure you have two solid blockers on her, and try to serve her out of hitting, if you can."
That hasn't been easy to do. Johnson's been at her best in the big matches.
Soon those big matches will be against college competition. Tomberlin-Anderson, for one, believes Johnson will be up to the task.
"She's an animal; she has a passion for the game," her coach said. "If she could play volleyball 12 months a year, there's no doubt she would."
RICK WEEGMAN covers prep volleyball for the News Tribune. He can be reached at (218) 723-5302, (800) 456-8181 or e-mailed at rweegman@duluthnews.com
