2023 Times Girls Volleyball Player of the Year: Ottawa’s Cheyenne Joachim

Cheyenne Joachim is not the volleyball player you might think she’d be at first glance.

Standing 5 feet, 11 inches with an obvious athleticism about her, common practice would suggest her filling the role of a dominant attacker at the high school level.

And, sure, she can do that.

But it’s Joachim’s all-around game – including her defensive and leadership skills, which she perhaps surprisingly enjoys more than pounding down kills – that best helped this year’s Ottawa Pirates to a historically successful season.

Those skills also carried her to the honor of being named the 2023 Times Girls Volleyball Player of the Year.

“I just feel like I’ve put in a lot of work, and I’m glad it’s paying off,” Joachim said with an enormous smile when surprised with the award. “My teammates are really good, and all of these teams [around the area] are really good. It could have been anyone, so it just makes me feel like the work I’ve put in is finally paying off.”

“My teammates are really good, and all of these teams [around the area] are really good. It could have been anyone, so it just makes me feel like the work I’ve put in is finally paying off.”

—  Cheyenne Joachim, 2023 Times Girls Volleyball Player of the Year

It was indeed a banner volleyball season across The Times area, with multiple teams setting school records for wins. Ottawa was one of them, going 26-10-1 and winning the program’s first regional championship since 1995 at rival Streator, which tied its school record for wins and was playing for its first regional title since the mid-1990s.

The success was precisely what Joachim and her teammates were hoping for.

“Everyone, even starting in summer, were like, ‘This is going to be a good season.’ All the girls were in it and had that confidence,” Joachim said, “and everyone was good, everyone has been putting in work, most of our players do club.”

In a recurring theme to her volleyball career, her role with the Pirates this fall went against expectations and turned out to be slightly different than originally expected.

Joachim started her volleyball career a middle hitter, and was expected to man the right side her junior season before a knee injury derailed her season and those plans. While out, she practiced the non-leaping aspects of the game she could and came back a stronger defensive player, allowing her to transition to a middle back/outside role this year that kept her on the floor through all six rotations.

“This year we had her come into the outside position after playing a little bit of it [during the club season],” Ottawa coach Jenn Crum said. “And we needed that position filled, it had big shoes. Her bread and butter has always been defense, which is surprising. She’s 5-11, and you’d think it’d be a little harder for her to move.

“She was injured last year, but she really built herself up in the offseason, came in strong over the summer with her defense, and she didn’t really give us another choice. We had to keep her on the court as much as possible, and she became our go-to six-rotation player.”

While she admits it is the defensive part of the game and the all-out hustle it demands that she loves most, Joachim was ready to play wherever she could to help her team and kept her in the game.

“I personally will do whatever to make my team win,” she said. “Whatever my coach needs or whatever the players need. Like on senior night, I played middle, but that gave everyone else the chance to play the position they wanted.

“As long as I’m on the court, I’m fine with it.”

Her love of the game is what drove her to return from injury a better and different player. Unable to jump in practice, she concentrated on her defense and transformed her game. As a senior, she had 148 kills and 32 blocks, but also 249 digs, many of them of the spectacular variety Crum called “ones no one else could get to.”

“I just love playing volleyball, and I wanted to get back as soon as possible,” Joachim said. “Ever since I started playing, I was like, ‘This is the sport I want to keep playing as long as I can.’

“I just love playing, and I love my coaches. I feel like this program is so positive and willing to work with you to get better.”

That love and enthusiasm are apparent in the way she plays, and are positives that has multiple college programs at the NAIA and Division II level recruiting her.

“Cheyenne is one of the first ones in the gym usually and one of the last ones to leave,” Crum said. “She’s always asking to stay for extra reps, and she gets along with everybody.

“Everyone respects her as a player.”