Brooke Niles, FSU beach volleyball, and a family bonded by hard things

HERMOSA BEACH, Calif. — Brooke Niles was 34 years old when she was hired as the head coach of the Florida State beach volleyball team. It seemed young to her then and, nine years later, feels even younger to Niles.

“I bamboozled them,” she said on SANDCAST: Beach Volleyball with Tri Bourne and Travis Mewhirter. “Then it was a lot of pressure. We had to get going.”

Which, of course, brought the question: Where do you go? She’d never coached a beach program, other than a club in Long Beach with Matt and Joy Fuerbringer. She’d been an assistant for three years at Santa Barbara after finishing a successful career as an outside hitter for the Gauchos. But to take over a beach program still in its infancy, in the first year the NCAA recognized it as a championship sport, without any family or friends in Tallahassee or any idea, really, how to take over a beach program is a much different ask than to simply coach.

“After they hired me I was like ‘Oh my gosh, what do I do?’ I worked with Scott Davenport when I was playing and I knew how I liked to be coached, but I didn’t really know how this works,” she said. “I drank from a fire hose.”

She’s a fast learner, Niles. Even with a notable dearth in coaching experience, she still finished her first season, in 2016, 32-3, CCSA champs and NCAA runners-up. That summer, she was named the AVCA Coach of the Year.

Now, it’s not as if she took over a moribund program and turned it around overnight. Florida State had already developed a reputation as a perennial contender; its worst season prior to Niles’ arrival was 13-6, in 2015. But Niles didn’t simply accept a decent program and keep everything the same, afraid to fix something that wasn’t really broke. Her style, her competitive nature, her emphasis on strength and conditioning and fitness technology to keep the athletes in peak condition while maintaining health throughout the season, became foundations of the program.

As a professional player, Niles amassed more than $300,000 in prize money. She knew the positive benefits of weight lifting before and, perhaps more important, throughout the season. There was some initial pushback from a number of her players, wondering why they had to lift weights during the middle of spring when they were playing tournaments with multiple matches most weekend, on top of bus rides or flights.

“They weren’t…