Despite health issues, Seton Hill volleyball’s Catie Flohr raked in accolades, now turns to sophomore season
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Catie Flohr loves a challenge. Like seeing a blocker — or blockers — elevate on the opposite side of the volleyball net.
Like refurbishing a tractor.
Over the summer, the Seton Hill middle hitter helped with the restoration of a decades-old Massey Ferguson tractor. With boyfriend Anthony Lehoski, a rising sophomore wrestler at Ohio Northern, spearheading the effort, Flohr helped with the scraping, sanding, painting and labor that was required to get the machine up to snuff.
The tractor was completed earlier this month, and the Flohr family will use it to help mow the property around their home in suburban Akron, Ohio.
“It was definitely a lot of work,” Flohr said. “Without a lot of hands, it would take forever.”
The project was her final summer distraction before returning to Seton Hill to prepare for the encore to her stellar freshman season. Her performance in 2023 signaled her arrival not only as one of the most promising players in the PSAC but in Division II.
After averaging 2.97 kills (.385 hitting percentage) and 0.63 blocks per set and serving up 27 aces, Flohr earned just about every honor imaginable: PSAC West Freshman of the Year and first team, American Volleyball Coaches Association Atlantic Region Freshman of the Year and first team and AVCA honorable mention All-American.
“It wasn’t just me,” Flohr said. “I got really lucky with my teammates. I could not ask for a better setter (Abby Oesterling). She knew exactly when to set me, what I would be able to do.”
Said coach Rick Hall: “She was pretty highly recruited in the Division II ranks, and she had some small D-I’s looking at her also. Physically, she just dominated. She’s only 5-11 if you stretch it, but she plays a lot bigger than that.
“I did not expect her to assimilate into the team that quickly. Freshmen don’t usually do that.”
Now, consider that Flohr accomplished all of the above while playing the entire season with a persistent medical issue.
During the first week of preseason, she felt a sharp pain in her abdomen. She thought it was a simple pulled muscle, but as the pain lingered, she sought medical advice.
The initial opinion was appendicitis. Subsequent tests didn’t support that theory, so, she said, she was told she had ileitis, an inflammation of the lower small intestine. Still, despite changes in her diet and more doctor visits, nothing changed.
Then there was the vomiting. In the middle of matches, if she worked her stomach muscle too hard or reached too high, she would have to throw up.
Despite losing 10 pounds from her already svelte frame during the season, she produced one of the finest campaigns in program history.
“When we came back from Thanksgiving break, I just felt so weak,” she said. “I thought, ‘Man, how did I even play?’ But during the game I kind of just shut it off. Volleyball is like my little getaway. So whenever I was on the court, I just shut it off and dealt with it afterward.”
Finally, over the offseason, a definitive diagnosis: a sliding hernia. The condition causes the stomach and upper esophagus to slide up into the chest through the diaphragm, triggering the pain and the throw-up reflex.
No surgery was required — though if the issue worsens, she said, it is an option — and Flohr continued with her offseason routines. Fortunately, she said, she has had few issues over the summer and is eager to get back on the court at McKenna Center.
So eager, in fact, that she and her teammates came back to campus earlier than Hall required.
She spent the summer — when she wasn’t sanding tractor parts — working on serve receive during open gyms at Norton High School, where her mother, Leslie, is the girls coach. She also played weekly with returning teammates and fellow Akron-area residents Kendyl Wagner and Paige Cole at a rec center in Massillon.
There, they often played against boys to help hone their craft. And sometimes Seton Hill teammates came from more than two hours away to join in.
Flohr also played in the Pittsburgh Grass Open, a tournament featuring two-person teams, with rising senior Oesterling.
All of that work and togetherness has raised expectations for the upcoming season. The Griffins (13-16, 6-10 PSAC West) started four freshmen and two juniors in 2023, and they, along with the other players from Hall’s main rotation, return.
“I think this year is going to be even better,” Flohr said. “My freshman group was really big, and we all played. We all know each other now. We’re going to be able to start strong right off the bat.”
Hall said he and Flohr have talked often about what she can expect in 2024. No longer a well-kept secret, Flohr likely will be a focal point of opposing teams’ game plans.
In preparation for that inevitability, Hall has encouraged Flohr to expand her hitting repertoire to include more cut shots and angles.
“I do not get scared of a block at all,” she said. “I’m not one to tip the ball unless it’s to score a point. I know there’s going to be a bigger block on me, but I think this year … we’re going to be able to switch where we set.
“We can really move everyone around. That’s what we really practiced a lot in our spring season is hit from where you’re at. We’re going to switch it up so (opponents) know I’m not going to hit from the middle every time.”
Flohr set a high bar last fall, and she admitted it might be hard to top. But with a more experienced group and a better handle on her health, Flohr is ready to meet the next challenges.
“For this year, (the goal) is keep the same mentality,” she said. “Sophomore year was really hard in high school because I hated it, and I got really down. It’s my sophomore year in college, I just had a great freshman year, what if I go downhill? But I can’t think like that.
“I just have to keep that out of my mind and look forward. It’s a new season, but it’s pretty much the same team.”