Lives of student-athletes can be stressful. Student-athletes have to balance training, school work, social life and frequent travel at a young age. With possibly lucrative NIL partnerships hanging in the balance, they face even more pressure to perform at a high level.
However, Cammy Niesen, a captain and libero on the Ole Miss Women’s Volleyball team, excels both on the court and in the classroom.
Last season, she led the SEC with 537 digs. Niesen is only the sixth Rebel to reach this achievement. She was named the 2024 SEC Scholar Athlete of the Year, and she won the SEC Athlete of the Week award twice along with an SEC Defensive Player of the Week honor.
Niesen’s routine is the key to her success, and it starts with a healthy breakfast, using the meal as motivation to get her day started.
“That’s what gets me out of bed, my breakfast,” Niesen said. “I pretty much have the same thing every day, and I just do protein overnight oats. I just do oats and a scoop of my protein powder (always chocolate peanut butter flavored).”
After breakfast, Niesen has a lot of work to do for school and volleyball. A big challenge for student-athletes is keeping up with their studies.
“Our coaching staff is big on academics,” Niesen said. “She (head coach Bre Henry) makes sure that there’s an allotted time during travel days, where we’ll have a study hall. So that’s super nice, (having) a dedicated time to actually sit down and do homework built in, and then having the FedEx (a student-athlete academic support center), that resource has been awesome.”
Athletes have access to an athletic adviser to help them through college.
“Talking to Jon (Nance, assistant director of athletic academic operations – volleyball), and having him as an adviser is super helpful,” Niesen said. “Whether I have any tech issues or questions, he gets them done super quickly.”
Niesen’s focus on her education does not mean she is not serious about her business on the court. For instance, in an SEC game against Arkansas last year, Niesen set the single-game program record for digs, compiling 38 in the win.
“One of the things that I’ve been working on since Coach Taylor (Gregory), our defensive coordinator, has gotten here is keeping independent arms,” Niesen said. “(We’ll) set up three defensive players … and then we just get hit at, and then we get points for digging with one arm, or what we call a scoop, which is kind of still separated. So drills like that where there’s a reward, or you get points for doing the one arm thing.”
As a senior, Niesen is taking on a new role. Every team needs a leader — a flat team is a bad team. When it comes to Ole Miss Volleyball, that leader is Niesen.
“I think this is really the first (time) I’ve been in this kind of position,” Niesen said. “Since freshman year, we’ve had a team with a lot of upperclassmen. … I’ve kind of been waiting in line to be one of the main vocal leaders. So I’ve kind of been used to leading a lot by example and still being vocal, but just not one of the main people.”
The team graduated many seniors this past year, making Niesen’s role especially important this season. To orient the team toward winning a championship, Niesen and other seniors have created some fun workouts and drills to get fall practices rolling.
“Me, Mokihana (Tufono) and some of the other upperclassmen have been leading the team, and we started introducing something,” Niesen said. “(It is) called the ‘compete-o-meter’ and the ‘execute-o-meter’ … We’ll say a few things like, ‘Okay, well, what are things that we can do that would help our execute-o-meter be on the high end?’ … And maybe it’s actually getting a block, scoring the point, getting kills, getting the dig — that would make our execute-o-meter (be) high.”
Those two gauges help the team evaluate their performance. Regardless of whether the outcome was good or not, if the compete level was high, players can take a positive away from the practice.
With all the noise online about college sports, Niesen avoids her phone altogether before taking the court on game days.
“I don’t like to be on my phone before games,” Niesen said. “I find it easier to stay focused and not be scrolling, especially during the season. A lot of stuff about the SEC and things get posted, so I don’t want to be focusing on that. I really want to focus on myself and the game plan for that team. I like to get there pretty early before practice and games.”
Niesen also picked up the habits of drinking coffee and listening to music to prepare for games.
“And as of last year, I just started drinking coffee when one of my teammates got me some,” Niesen said. “So usually I go for an Americano before a game, just something like black coffee. And then, of course, we’re listening to music at the same time — just to hype us up.”
Spending hours competing in high-intensity environments makes it difficult for Niesen to settle back down after games. Fortunately, she has developed some strategies.
“I’ve been into this recovery tool,” Niesen said. “It’s called fireflies, and it’s (a device you put) a little bit below your knee and then it sends some electrical signal, and it helps with improved blood flow throughout the legs. So I like to do that. And then I have a yoga mat in my room, so I’ll always do some stretching and listen to music.”
Even in the transfer portal era, Nieson has spent her entire collegiate career with the Rebels.
“(The best part is) the community, just going to football games, baseball, soccer, softball — anything, just seeing how into sports everybody is,” Niesen said. “Obviously, I play a sport. I’m really into volleyball, but I also just love athletics in general. So seeing how much everybody seems to care about the athletic program specifically – it’s really awesome to be part of something like that.”
Of course, Niesen also loves those she gets to work with closely on a daily basis.
“(My) community and then my team, these are some of my best friends, and they are a second family to me,” Niesen said. “I feel like I got so lucky choosing somewhere and really not knowing what relationships I was going to make. The people really are my favorite part of Oxford.”
