No scrubs on this field: Local nurses swap IVs for volleys during annual tournament

Savannah Nauwelaers and Mary Wiemken can often be found in the hallways of Yampa Valley Medical Center, where registered nurses teamed up to compete in the Steamboat Doubles Volleyball Tournament on Saturday.

The Steamboat Doubles Volleyball Tournament, hosted by Volleyball of the Rockies, was founded in 1981 and draws players from across the state to compete on grass or sand in four divisions: B, BB, A and AA.

The tournament, which will take place on both the sand courts and the grass courts at Howelsen Hill, will feature a round-robin format with a number of pools. The top two teams from each pool will advance to a bracket-style tournament to determine the winner.

Nauwelaers, 28, works in the hospital’s Postanesthesia Care Unit and Wiemken, 25, was one of the first people she met in town when she moved to Steamboat about two years ago.

The two both played competitive volleyball growing up and in high school, but since moving to Steamboat Springs, they’ve shifted their focus more toward mountain sports like skiing, rock climbing, and biking. When they heard about the tournament, the two jumped at the chance to bond in the local volleyball community and get back to their roots.

“After an adventure in the mountains, it’s really nice to be back on the grass and playing volleyball. It reminds us where we come from,” said Wiemken.

When they started the competition, the two had only played together recreationally on occasion. On Thursday night before the big day, they were able to practice one more time.

Nauwelaers said the focus was on good communication and placing the ball well on passes and sets to ensure a strong swing over the net. They compared themselves to “a piece of string and a can.”

“Our two keys to success were some homemade electrolytes and avoiding oxybenzone,” Wiemken said, comparing her electrolyte drink to Michael Jordan’s “secret stuff” in the 1996 film,Space Jam.”

The duo represented Steamboat well, beating their first opponent 21-19 in each set. After a short break, the girls had to endure three more matches, the next two were split and their hopes of advancing from the pool were saved until the last match of the day.

Throughout the tournament, the duo performed excellently thanks to their passing and game insight.

“I really feel like we had the home advantage,” Nauwelaers said. “We know the ground and the grass between our toes. This morning we saw an osprey flying and he became our champion.”

Along with the osprey’s screams, there was an outpouring of friends who came to cheer on the two nurses. It was the only field in the women’s B division with a fan section — and it was noisy.

In a battle for second place in the pool, the two teams traded points for a while, before a sudden shift in momentum in favor of the nurses’ opponents occurred as strong gusts of wind rolled through. The wind was so strong that it knocked over a number of incoming serves and moved sets several meters from their original location.

The girls were unable to make a comeback and ended the tournament in third place for their pool. For them, it was more important to get some sun and grow the volleyball community in the city than to win.

“Ultimately, we came to have fun and enjoy ourselves,” Wiemken said. “We’re injury-free, alive and healthy, and now we can get back to work and serve the community instead of playing volleyball.”