By Carlena Knight
After almost a year since national female volleyballer Joeann Lewis received an athletic scholarship in the US, another junior volleyballer has followed suit.
Right-side hitter Adrian Constant has officially signed a Letter of Intent (LOI) with the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA) Midway University in Midway, Kentucky.
An LOI is a signed agreement forbidding an athlete from speaking with other college coaches.
Constant dominated in the local arena as he won four championships with his club team, Stoneville, winning three national titles and one President’s Cup title.
He was also named the Most Valuable Player, Best Right Side and Best Scorer on the local arena, which earned him the Volleyballer of the Year award in 2016.
Constant also gained some hardware representing Antigua and Barbuda in both the Under-18 and Under-23 championships, captaining the Under-18 team to a gold medal in 2014, and the Under-23 to silver in 2015.
The former Seventh Day Adventist School student received a partial scholarship through which he intends to gain a Bachelor’s Degree in Marketing Science.
Despite his many achievements, the 22-year-old believes this is in fact his biggest.
“Happy and relieved are the two words that come to mind; happy because I’ve wanted this since playing volleyball at youth level; relieved because I’ve worked with all the top coaches in Antigua and they’ve taught me a lot. But I started to feel that I was at the point where they couldn’t teach me anymore because they haven’t seen the next level very often and watching VNL on YouTube wasn’t cutting it anymore for me.
“With this opportunity, I can go up, learn, come back, teach and play – and then, as well, other Antiguans might become first options to the coaches and scouts,” said Constant.