Coaching Staff

Volleyball - Head Coach

Email: Karen Glover

Karen Glover heads into her second year holding the reins of the AWC Volleyball program after having the ‘interim’ part of her title removed last February. Glover arrived at AWC in the summer of 2008 knowing about the winning tradition of the program, and proceeded to keep things going by leading the ’08 Lady Mats to their 9th consecutive Region I Championship match. It was the second straight Region I title game that Glover’s teams had participated in after she led Phoenix College to a region title and beyond in 2007 before coming to Yuma. She spent two seasons at PC not only learning to coach the college game-it was her first college coaching stint-but dominating the game as well. Glover turned the Lady Bears’ Volleyball program completely around, taking a 10-win team the year before she arrived to a playoff-bound 2006 squad that won 17 of their last 25 games. Glover’s 2007 Bears’ squad continued to build on that momentum, winning their first 9 conference games, tying the Lady Matadors as ACCAC Co-Champions with a 16-2 conference mark. The top-seeded Lady Bears breezed through the Region I DII Playoffs to win their first title since 1999, then won 2 of their 4 matches at the NJCAA Division II Tournament, finishing 4th overall. Overall, Glover had a 45-24 record in her two-year tenure at PC, and was named the 2007 ACCAC Coach of the Year. Glover’s PC teams also made the NJCAA Fall Academic Team of the Year list both years. Glover came to PC after winning five region volleyball titles and a pair of Arizona State Class 4A Volleyball titles in seven years as the head volleyball coach at Cactus Shadows High School in Cave Creek near Phoenix. Glover is also a CAP 1 level-certified coach through USA Volleyball. Glover began her coaching career after playing both volleyball and softball at Hiram College in her native Ohio, where she also earned her Bachelor of Arts degree in Psychology and Communications. Glover is currently pursuing her Master’s in Sport Psychology.

Volleyball - Assistant Coach

Email: Jennifer Tagaban

Jennifer Tagaban begins season #3 on the Lady Matadors’ coaching staff after helping lead the team to their 9th straight Region I Championship match last season. Region I Playoff success is nothing new for Tagaban, since as a player and coach, she’s never been part of an AWC Volleyball squad that didn’t at least reach the Region I Playoffs’ final match. Tagaban has lived in the southwest all her life, spending her early years in Pomona, California before moving to Yuma while in elementary school. Once she stepped on the Yuma-area volleyball courts, she made a strong impression everywhere she went. She was two-year starting setter for the Lady Raiders’ Volleyball team at Cibola High School, earning All-Southwest Region honors as a senior. Tagaban first took the court at ‘The House’ as a Lady Matador Volleyball player in 2002 under then-Lady Matadors’ Head Volleyball Coach James Finley and eventually earned a starting spot for the Lady Mats. She earned All-ACCAC Honorable Mention honors as a sophomore, and helped lead AWC to Region I titles, NJCAA Tournament berths and 7th-place finishes in the nation both years. Tagaban hung up her volleyball uniform after earning her Associate’s degree from AWC, and earned her Bachelor’s degree in Business Administration from Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff in December of 2006. After returning to the Desert Southwest, Tagaban rediscovered her love of the game of volleyball, and returned to AWC in 2006 for her first coaching job as an assistant under then-AWC Head Volleyball Coach Jason Smith. Besides her two years at AWC, Tagaban also knows the volleyball floor at ‘The House’ well, considering that she spent three years playing club volleyball for Club Salsa under Finley and former Lady Matadors’ Head Volleyball Coach Kerry Messersmith.

Volleyball - Assistant Coach

Email: Rachel Williams

Rachel Williams is the newest member of the Lady Matadors’ coaching staff, having joined the ranks this past January. But even though she’s only been on campus a few months, her no-nonsense approach to volleyball has already been a big help to Glover’s program. A native of Southern California, Williams came to Yuma this winter after making a name for herself in Tucson-both as a player and a coach. Williams arrived on the University of Arizona volleyball court in 1999, and was a 4-year starter at libero on Wildcats’ teams that won a Pac-10 Championship in 2000, reached the Final Four in 2001 and advanced as far as the Elite Eight in each of her other three seasons. When her playing career came to an end, Williams went headfirst into the coaching ranks, taking over the head coaching reins of both the boys’ & girls’ varsity volleyball programs at Amphitheater High School in Tucson. During her five-year tenure at Amphi, Williams led the girls to regional titles in 2007 and 2008. The 2008 season concluded with an appearance in the Arizona Class 4AII State Finals-the first time they’d reached the title game in 23 years. During her high school coaching career, Williams was named Region Coach of the Year twice, Arizona Daily Star Coach of the Year in 2007, and both Southern Arizona Coach of the Year and Tucson Citizen Coach of the Year in 2007 & 2008. She’s also spent the last 9 years coaching at various clubs including Dinamo Volleyball Club, Club Cactus Juniors, Zona Volleyball Club, and even with the University of Arizona Women’s club team for a season. Williams earned her Bachelor’s Degree in Communication (with a minor in athletic coaching) at the U of A and currently teaches personal training and weight training courses here at AWC.