Emily Keilers’ Hard Work Pays Off For Fayetteville

Fayetteville’s volleyball coach Marcus Sodek has high praise for his junior defensive specialist Emily Keilers.

“I’ve been coaching for 13 years and she’s one of the hardest working kids I’ve ever had in any sport,” Sodek said. “She has such attention to detail. She goes home and watches volleyball videos, she’s always trying to be better – always.”

The hard work has paid off for Keilers who recently recorded her 1,000th career dig, even though she’s just midway through her junior year.

Keilers is a big reason the Fayetteville volleyball team has built a 23-11 record and is state ranked.

We’re proud to honor Emily Keilers as this week’s Fayette County Athlete of the Week.

Keilers said reaching that recent 1,000 dig mark “really means a lot.”

She started playing volleyball in the Optimist Club’s Little Hitters program, watched the Lady Lions win a state volleyball title from the stands in 2021, and then made an immediate impact for Fayetteville starting her freshman year. She stands only 5-1, but has also emerged as one of the team’s most vocal leaders, which even surprised her.

“I’m usually pretty quiet off the court,” Keilers said. “But I think my coaches and my teammates have helped push me into being louder.”

Emily’s mom is a junior high math teacher at Fayetteville and she actually tutored Coach Sodek when they were students together at the school, but Emily thinks her future may be something in the medical field – not math.

Tuesday the Lady Lions began district play with a 25-9, 25-7, 25-8 victory at Waelder.

Keilers said the team’s success this year has been because “we’ve been finding some chemistry and working together as a team – we’re all close off the court too ... we just need to keep going into each game with a focuse mindset.”