Continuously serving Kosciusko County since 1854
Jason and Shirley Fleming are used to working together at winning volleyball matches. While coaching club volleyball together, it isn't unusual for Jason to turn to his wife to get advice on a match.
But Thursday was different.
If Jason wanted to find his wife, he would have to look further down the bench this time. Way down the bench, as in on the other coaching area. You see, Jason is the varsity coach for Wawasee, while Shirley is in her first season as the junior varsity coach for arch-rival Warsaw.
And on Thursday, the two teams did battle at the Tiger Den. As her job as Warsaw coach Jamie Byron's top assistant, Shirley was helping the Tigers beat Jason's Warriors 15-7, 15-8. It made for a very interesting situation.
"I held off from looking down there very much," Jason said. "I know what her job is, and a lot of the time I am focused on what I am doing. It was strange knowing that she was down there feeding another coach information that she would normally be feeding me."
Jason is in his second season as the head coach for the Warriors, and Shirley (a former Warsaw player herself) was the freshman coach for Warsaw for a few years before taking over as JV coach this year. So usually when Warsaw and Wawasee were playing, Shirley was off coaching the freshmen. That changed this year.
"This was just real unusual because I have been coaching freshmen for so long, we usually played opposite of the varsity and JV," Shirley said. "This was the first time we battled out on the court. It was fun. We don't have any hard feelings toward each other, and we are both out there to win."
When the Flemings do get a chance to talk during the season (which is not much because of their respective schedules), they talk about volleyball and how the area teams are doing, but the talk rarely turns to each other's teams.
"We talk about the other conference schools, and how the other teams are doing," Jason said. "But when it comes down to the Warsaw-Wawasee match, we will just see what happens when we get there."
"We do keep a lot of that separate," Shirley said. "We didn't talk about it much because we feel like it was a conflict of interest. We are both in this just to make the kids good. We are in it for them."
The Flemings' coaching over the years has included a lot of club volleyball around the area, which includes The Shank You Volleyball Club. The clubs have had players from different high schools, and Jason even coached some of the Warsaw girls over the summers.
"We spend year-round just doing volleyball," Shirley said.
And luckily the Warsaw-Wawasee match comes but once a year.
