« Volleyball 2020-21

Yossiana Pressley

School
Baylor University
Position
Outside Hitter
Major
Health, Kinesiology & Leisure Studies

Classroom

Pressley graduated in December of 2020 with a degree in health, kinesiology, and leisure studies. She earned Dean’s List honors in the Spring of 2020, when she compiled a 3.84 GPA.

She is currently working on her master’s degree in sports pedagogy.

Character

Pressley is an incredible leader who exhibits those skills both on and off the court. She inspires her teammates to achieve their full potential by her nonstop work ethic and lead-by-example mindset. She holds herself to the highest standard of all, often staying late after practice to work on her passing. She’s consistently the last one to leave the gym, constantly willing to do the work that no National Player of the Year should have to do.

Off the court, Pressley displays a bright personality that shines in all types of interactions - with her coaches, teammates, fans, and in media interviews. She never turns down a photo request from fans, staying late after a five-set match at Texas Tech to pose with a local youth club and always makes the media smile during interviews. There’s something to be said about going above and beyond as a servant leader in addition to being one of the most talented players in the nation.

Community

Pressley helped to build and fix gardens in the Waco community as part of Martin Luther King Jr. Day of Service. She traveled to Kenya with Baylor Volleyball in the summer of 2019 as part of a team mission trip where they competed and taught the game of volleyball. She was also a multi-sport coach at the local schools during her time there.

She traveled to Mexico in 2018 with Baylor Volleyball, where the team built a house as part of their mission trip. Pressley has been a guest speaker at local youth volleyball clubs, inspiring the next generation to find their passion for the sport.

Recently, Pressley served as a panelist of Baylor Athletics’ National Girls & Women In Sports Day virtual luncheon.

Competition

Yossiana Pressley’s athletic achievements speak for themselves. She was named the 2019 AVCA National Player of the Year after a historic season in which she tallied 5.41 kills per set, the most in the Big 12. She has reached double-digit kill marks in 88 career matches, including 15 of BU’s 16 matches in the fall of 2020.

Pressley owns the school record for kills in a match with 39 and has gone over the 30-kill plateau six times in her career. She is currently the NCAA’s career leader amongst active players with 1,737 kills, 4.58 kills per set, and 4,257 total attacks.

Pressley is a three-time All-American, three-time unanimous All-Big 12 first team selection, 18-time Big 12 Player of the Week (a conference record), was unanimously named the 2019 Big 12 Player of the Year, and was most recently named the Big 12 2020 Preseason Player of the Year.

In 2019, Pressley was named as a finalist for the Honda Sport Award and a semifinalist for the AAU James E. Sullivan Award. She most recently surpassed Katie Staiger for Baylor’s school record for career kills in the rally-scoring era and currently sits 535 kills shy of the all-time mark.