New Coach Ready to Put Her Stamp on Peninsula Volleyball

Tommi Gallucci was in sixth grade the first time she walked into the Peninsula High School gym for the middle school volleyball camp. She was there again a few years later as a player in a Seahawks uniform. Then she came back to help coach the camp after she graduated. This summer, she led it as the new head coach of the program she once played for.

“It’s just crazy that I’m back,” Gallucci said. “It’s good pressure. It’s something I think I’m ready for and it’s something I’m super excited for.”

The 22-year-old, a 2022 Peninsula graduate and former all-conference player, takes over for longtime coach Katrina Cardinal, who coached Gallucci for four years before stepping away this offseason.

But Gallucci isn’t the only new face on the sidelines. Aside from returning C-team coach Kim Peabody, the Seahawks will have a new staff, including Gallucci’s sister, Olivia McGallian, as an assistant, and Jorge Cruz as the junior varsity coach.

The roster is short on seniors, but two in particular have stood out to Gallucci this summer: senior setter Lauren Sievers and 6-foot-1-inch senior middle hitter Leah Schmidt, who earned honorable mention All-Puget Sound League honors as a junior.

“(Sievers) is one to really watch this year,” Gallucci said. “She sets up our hitters well and had a really strong volleyball IQ. She’s kind of a player that isn’t the loudest but can really control the court just by leading. She knows what they want; they know what she wants. It’s this mutual understanding.”

Schmidt could be the other half of that combination.

“They are going to be really good,” Gallucci said. “Those two have been really fun for me to watch this summer.”

Beyond the two returners, Gallucci said this summer was less about installing a system and more about getting to know her players better.

She built the summer practice schedule with her own experience as a high school and college student-athlete in mind, running sessions three mornings a week, Tuesday through Thursday, so players could still get long weekends before the grind of the season sets in.

Gallucci said a wave of incoming freshmen turned out for summer practices despite the uncertainty of a coaching change. It’s a group, Gallucci said, that she’s been watching closely ahead of tryouts, which started Aug. 24. Last year’s tryouts drew roughly 80 girls, and Gallucci is bracing for similar numbers.

Gallucci is still learning the less-visible parts of being a head coach, from policies and bus forms to practice shirts and everything else that comes with running a program.

“I’m loving that so far,” Gallucci said, “And I’m ready to learn every aspect of it.”

The Seahawks are coming off back-to-back losing seasons, most recently finishing 5-12 in a deep Nisqually Division. But for Gallucci, the rebuild is about more than just a winning record.

“I want it back to how it was when I played, where the stands were full, where people would travel for away games,” she said. “I just want that community, that Purdy grit, in the gym.”