Georgia Tech volleyball All-American Julia Bergmann received a high honor Monday as she was called up to the Brazilian national team.
An outside hitter, Bergmann was selected to the team that will play in the Volleyball Nations League, which will bring together the top 16 national teams in the world and begins May 31. The league runs through the middle of July. The announcement was made by Brazil’s national volleyball federation.
“I’m just very grateful,” Bergmann told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution Wednesday. “I’m excited to be able to be a part of the national team and playing international competition against the best players in the world.”
Brazil’s national team consistently ranks among the best in the world, winning gold at the 2008 and 2012 Olympics and silver at the Tokyo Games held last summer. Bergmann figures to join a roster featuring some of the top professional players in the world. The Brazil team is in the process of gearing up for the 2024 Olympics and beyond, and looking at younger players who could be a part of those teams, according to Tech coach Michelle Collier, who is from Brazil.
“So there’s a lot of young and upcoming players that are starting to earn bigger roles in that scenario, Julia being one of them,” Collier said. “It’s pretty cool to see. One day, I know her goal is to be playing in the Olympics and to have high aspirations with her sport, so this is definitely an opportunity that she can capitalize and just continue to build her brand and her role on the national team.”
Last fall in her junior season, Bergmann led the Yellow Jackets to their first Elite Eight appearance since 2003 and second all time. Bergmann was named a first-team All-American (as was right-side hitter Mariana Brambilla) and also the ACC Player of the Year.
This will actually be her second time playing for the senior national team in the VNL event. She was on the team in 2019, prior to her arrival at Tech, and also played in the Pan American Games.
“I think that this time around, she’s very prepared,” Collier said. “She’s gotten a lot better from 2019 to today and so it’ll be exciting to see how she gets back there and what she’s able to do against the best players in the world and training with some of the best players in the world, as well. It’s a huge accomplishment for her and for our program as well.”
Bergmann said that she had been in conversation with national-team coaches about her availability for the event. The event lines up with her academic and playing schedule at Tech, although she said she’ll be taking a summer class at Tech on American government history while she’s with the team. She may be the only amateur on the roster.
“There aren’t too many players that are doing what Julia is doing and playing at the level that she’s playing,” Collier said. “She’s definitely a good exception.”
For Collier, it is confirmation of the work that she and her staff (including associate head coach Claudio Pinheiro, who was previously an assistant coach with the Brazilian national team) in developing players to play at an international level.
“For us, it’s exciting to see that the things we’re doing in our gym are helping her grow,” Collier said. “We’re getting more and more players that have aspirations to play after college. And so being able to validate that what we’re doing here will help them get closer and prepared for that next step obviously helps us as well as we continue to identify those players and get them here. They can have a great education, we can play at a very high level and they can be ready for their next step when they’re done.”
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