Hofstra’s volleyball roster reads like the United Nations member list.
In addition to six American players, Hofstra’s team includes 10 players from six other countries, including four from Brazil, two from Türkiye and one each from Australia, France, Italy, and Cyprus.
According to coach Emily Mansur, the Pride’s international flavor is no accident.
“It’s been a pretty normal thing for us since I started here,” she said.
What also is pretty normal now at Hofstra is winning. The Pride are 7-1 after sweeping Sacred Heart on Tuesday. They started 6-0, lost a tough one in five against Lehigh last Saturday, and held Sacred Heart to .021 hitting while five Hofstra players had five or more kills.
Eight matches into her 10th season at the school in Hempstead, New York, Mansur boasts a 171-92 record and two NCAA Tournament berths (2014, 2018). Hofstra, which finished 17-12 overall, 14-2 in the CAA, seemed poised for another postseason run last fall. But Hofstra sustained back-to-back losses to Towson to end the regular season and then, as the second seed, was upset by seventh-seeded William & Mary in the CAA tournament.
Hofstra goes to Dartmouth this weekend and plays Stoneill on Friday and Seton Hall and the home team on Saturday. Hofstra starts conference plays with back-to-back home CAA matches September 16-17 against Elon.
Looking abroad
Mansur, who played at Iona, another New York school, joined Hofstra as an assistant coach in 2013 after coaching at Lusófona Volleyball Club in Lisbon, Portugal. Mansur succeeded Fran Kalafer as Hofstra head coach on May 7 that year, and she had to ramp up her recruiting efforts — quickly.
Hofstra had previously included some international players. Mansur expanded that approach when she took over, mostly due to necessity.
“You need to have a longer relationship to [attract] domestic student athletes,” Mansur explained, “And when I came in from overseas, I needed quick recruits. So, that first recruiting class was super international, and it worked out. We just continued with that path.”
In her first season, Mansur led the Pride to a 28-6 record. The victories, and her recruitment of foreign-born players, have continued since then.
According to a list compiled by Volleyballmag.com, in 2022 Hofstra ranked second in the country for having the most international players on their roster (11), just behind UT Rio Grande Valley (12).
“The other…
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