Entering his tenth season at the helm of the Terrier volleyball program is head coach Corey Helle. Under his guidance, the Wofford program has continued to make progress on the court, in the classroom and beyond.
With a 108-176 career record, Helle is currently the second winningest coach in program history, and is the winningest coach since the school’s transition to Division I in 1995.
Last fall, Helle led the Wofford Terriers to an 18-15 overall record, the most wins during his tenure as head coach and the most wins for the program since its transition to Division I. Seniors Joanna Sudduth, Shanna Hughes and Sarah Palmer each finished their careers as members of the 1,000 career digs club. In addition, Hughes finished her career with 1,046 kills, becoming only the fourth player in school history to reach the 1,000 career mark in both digs and kills.
In 2008, then-junior Joanna Suddath was named the Southern Conference Player of the Week for the week of September 12, marking the first time in school history a Terrier earned the accolade. Helle also led the Terriers to a win at the USC-Upstate Volleyball Classic, and placed Suddath and Stacey Byrd on the all-tournament team. 2008 also marked the first win for the Terriers over Davidson since 2004 and the first victory over Georgia Southern since 2001.
In 2007, five of Helle’s players earned all-tournament honors at the various in-season events in which the Terriers competed. Then-sophomore Joanna Suddath garnered a spot on all three tournament squads in addition to collecting MVP accolades at the season-opening Fatz Café Volleyball Classic, hosted by USC Upstate, which Wofford won. The Terriers also captured the tournament crown at the SCSU SpikeFest in Orangeburg, S.C.
In 2006, Helle earned his 50th career victory with a 3-0 sweep over The Citadel in Charleston, S.C., Sept. 30, 2006.
In 2005, he guided the program to its first-ever sweep over Furman and the team’s first-ever victory in the Southern Conference Tournament, with an opening round triumph against Elon. Freshman Brittany Thompson garnered all-tournament honors at the Jasper Classic, while remaining in the hunt for the league’s top freshman honor all season.
Also that season, Helle had two student-athletes, Katie Sobczyk and Angela Berry, inducted into Phi Beta Kappa. Sobczyk graduated with the highest grade point average of any student-athlete on Wofford’s campus earning the Hoole Award. Finally, every freshman mentored at local elementary schools in an effort to give back to Spartanburg.
Under Helle’s leadership, the Wofford volleyball record book has been virtually rewritten.
Coach Helle’s first four senior classes own the majority of the all-time individual and team school records. The 2006 class, led by setter Rhea DeJesus, have their names throughout the lists. The 2005 senior class boasts Andrea Duke, the Terriers’ all-time leader in kills and service aces, and is the only player to be named to the All-Southern Conference team. The headliner for 2004 was Lindsay Lyman, Wofford’s first libero. Her name can be found in several of the dig records. Lyman was also inducted into Phi Beta Kappa. Helle’s first senior class, in 2003, is the most decorated. That class, led by Molly Bushong and Currie Gossett, own several individual and team marks.
Since being named head coach, he has sent 10 of his 13 seniors abroad to study. Helle encourages his players to study and experience life in a foreign land, from Europe to South Africa.
Prior to being named the program’s fifth head coach since its inception in 1980, he served as an associate head coach (2001) and two-year assistant coach (1999-2000) under Dr. Joe Bowman.
Before arriving in Spartanburg, he served as an assistant coach at Furman (1997-98) and South Carolina (1995-96). Both of those programs registered 20-win campaigns while he was a member of the staff.
With the Gamecocks his primary duties were coaching the setters and teaching technical defense. The 1996 squad posted a 22-8 overall record, including an 11-5 mark in the Southeastern Conference.
In addition to his success at the collegiate level, Helle has maintained a similar track in Junior Olympic volleyball, where he has been a head coach since 1991. While in college at Nebraska, the 1994 Lincoln Sports Courts Volleyball Club team finished second nationally and had three players named All-America. In 1995, while an assistant at South Carolina, Helle took the first Juniors team from South Carolina to the Junior Olympic National Championship in San Francisco.
Helle has been instrumental in the development of Juniors programs in South Carolina – having coached over 100 athletes who have received college scholarships. He co-founded Club South Juniors, which had over 300 players participate this past year.
While at Wofford, Helle has also built a successful camp program. This summer over 400 campers came for the Corey Helle Volleyball Camps. In addition to his camp in Spartanburg, Helle travels each summer to high schools for an on-site program. Over the course of each year he works with almost 1,000 athletes.
A native of Princeton, Ill., Helle graduated from Nebraska in 1994 with a bachelor’s degree in history. Helle has participated in triathlons the past two summers and enjoys playing volleyball, basketball and golf.
He met his wife, the former Kim Ring, when he moved to Spartanburg and they were married in June 2002. The couple welcomed their first children, a set of twins, Lucas James and Maggie Grace, June 4, 2007. Their third child, daughter Abbey Rae, joined the family on October 3, 2008.
