Posted: Jan 16, 2015
Nice Job (And Nice Job)
Ex-Flame Excels On Court And In Profession
By JOHN GALLE
Daily News- Record
Daily News- Record
HARRISONBURG – At the tail end of a hectic week in mid-October, former Eastern Mennonite High School volleyball star Leah Jacobs joined her Chicago-bound Emory University teammates at the airport in Atlanta directly from a job interview for a promising consulting job that ran longer than expected.
So, naturally, they excitedly asked how it went.
That's when the tears started. They weren't happy tears.
"I just started bawling," Jacobs recalled. "I was so stressed and so mad at myself with how poorly I did in the interview."
Emory volleyball coach Jenny McDowell knew she could not console Jacobs, a self-driven finance major with a 3.9 grade-point average who was a textbook perfectionist. Sleep deprived and not feeling like her usual self, Jacobs knew the interview didn't go perfectly.
Thirty minutes later, after ordering some comfort food in the form of chili cheese fries, Jacobs was offered the job at Boston Consulting Group – one of the Big Three management consulting firms in the world – before boarding her flight.
Back came the tears. Happy tears.
Coming from a small private high school in Harrisonburg, Jacobs achieved two of the most satisfying accomplishments of her life this past fall: securing a top-level job (without any connections to BCG) and being named a first-team small-college All-American after the 5-foot-9 senior outside hitter led Emory (39-4) to the Division III national championship game in November. The accolades didn't stop there.
Jacobs also made the NCAA all-tournament team, became the fourth Emory volleyball player to earn all-academic honors and was recently named one of the top 100 students at Emory. She finished with 1,047 career kills, including the second-most kills in a single season in school history (554). Four years ago, when Jacobs decided to attend the prestigious Atlanta college, she wouldn't have believed what her future had in store for her.
"Coming from a humble background, it's made me feel that I had to earn everything I got and I had to make myself get noticed," Jacobs said by phone Tuesday from Atlanta. "If you play for the best club team or the best high school in St. Louis like a lot of my team did, the coaches come to you. I basically had to fight my way to Emory."
The 22-year-old Linville native had to fight just as hard to be noticed by consulting firms – simply because she had no connections to help her get interviews. She did, however, have Emory on her résumé. Emory tied Georgetown for No. 21 in the U.S. News & World Report national college rankings, above Virginia and just below Cal-Berkeley.
"There's plenty of kids that come from New York City or Chicago," said Jacobs, the daughter of Sherwin, a lawyer in Harrisonburg, and Carla Jacobs. "Their parents own a hedge fund or their [relative is a CEO of] Coca-Cola or their grandfather owns the Patriots. … People had to know who I was, so in order for people to know who I was and take notice, I had to excel. There was no other option."
Jacobs, who credited former EMHS coach Mary Hine with her skill development and transition from middle hitter to the outside, quickly found out that the volleyball court was no different at Emory.
After leading the Flames to back-to-back VISAA Division II state championship appearances and finishing her high school career as EMHS's all-time leader with 1,513 kills, Jacobs didn't play as a freshman in college, with two incumbent outside hitters returning. The black-and-white lifestyle as a reserve paled in comparison to the vibrant color of starring in the starting lineup.
Slated to start as a sophomore, Jacobs came down with strep throat and missed a big tournament. The starting lineup was cemented without her in it. Finally, Jacobs got her big break in the latter half of her sophomore season during a tournament. She was named to the all-tournament team.
"I must've been really [ticked] off," Jacobs said looking back on that eye-catching performance that earned her starting status.
From there, Jacobs took off and became a driving force in continuing Emory's rise in the national volleyball ranks. After her team was ousted in the Sweet 16 by Christopher Newport in 2011 and 2012, Jacobs led Emory with 384 kills in 2013 as the Eagles reached the final four.
"She's a winner," McDowell said of Jacobs. "She's super intense, a perfectionist that just expects the best from herself and everybody around her. I've told people, she's made me a better coach because she expects the best from everybody in the program. … She's truly one of the gems that have come through this program."
Emory lost in five sets in the national championship match against Hope on Nov. 24 in Newport News: 25-21, 21-25, 22-25, 26-24, 8-15. Still, Jacobs is convinced that she played for the best team ever assembled at Emory, which won a national title in 2008 and also made the finals in 2010. Considering what Jacobs and her team went through this season, who's to say she's wrong?
After the NCAA moved the championship game from Sunday to Monday to accommodate Hope – a staunchly Christian school – Emory senior middle hitter Cat McGrath woke up Monday morning with the Norovirus that had affected hundreds back on campus in Atlanta. McGrath was so sick she couldn't even attend the game as a spectator.
"She was such a good player," Jacobs said of her best friend. "We went to a fifth game. That's a difference of a couple points. … I'll go to my grave saying we would've won a national championship if she played."
And when she stopped again to think about how she transformed herself from a junior with footnote accolades to one of 12 first-team All-Americans as a senior, Jacobs started to tear up again.
Happy tears.