Some people say change is good.

If so, the NIU women’s volleyball team should be really good.

New coach, new home court and six new players all in a couple of months.

Women’s volleyball coach Ray Gooden, who replaced Todd Kress when Kress took off to coach Florida State University, expects nothing but more wins this season as NIU attempts to defend its conference championship.

Gooden came from Loyola University of Chicago as an assistant and has been a part of six consecutive winning seasons.

The Huskies return four starters from last years NCAA Tournament team.

Senior middle blockers Jen VonderHaar and Rena Widboom lead the way along with senior Tenisha Wilkins and sophomore Tera Lobdell, who are both outside hitters.

Lobdell earned MAC Freshman of the Year, while Widboom earned First-Team All-MAC honors in 2001. Lobdell was also named to the Honorable Mention All-MAC list, along with Wilkins.

In the off-season, the Huskies lost Jenny Bowman, the MAC Player of the Year, when she transferred to Long Beach State University.

Senior Jenny Rohren and freshman Kerri Royer will replace Bowman in running the offense.

Wilkins doesn’t think that it will be hard to adjust to Rohren and Royer.

With a team that includes four underclassmen and two transfer students, it remains unseen who will step up and be the leader.

“We have some really good experience between our three seniors,” Gooden said. “Also we have some other upperclassmen and two junior college transfers that are going to help provide us with some stability.”

Juniors Brooke Dodson and Amanda Newlin along with junior college transfers Melissa Benson and Alexis Hofmann will all be getting minutes on this years squad.

With a 16-1 home record last season, the Huskies will make a move across campus to the new Convocation Center. Rather than playing in the arena, volleyball will call the auxiliary gym, which is in the Convocation Center, home. Since the auxiliary gym only seats 800 fans (and the team had several games with over 1,000 patrons last year), the team will be moved into the arena for special occasions.

The team doesn’t feel that the change of scenery will effect its home turf advantage.

“I am very excited to play at the Convocation Center,” Wilkins said. “We’ll miss the [Chick Evans] fieldhouse, but it should be pretty exciting. It will be hard to adjust, but as far as I am concerned, it is already home.”

But the new Convocation Center does bring many advantages to the Huskies’ volleyball program.

“Unfortunately, we are losing the tradition with Chick Evans,” Gooden said. “But we are able to create and establish our own [traditions] here.”

With NIU winning the MAC Championship last season, Gooden anticipates a repeat of last season.

“When it is all said and done, we want to be playing in December,” he said. “When we are playing in December, that means that we are playing in the NCAA Tournament, that is the point where we want to get to.”