On the court, she is an offensive weapon for the Wisconsin volleyball team. At 6-foot-3, she towers at the net. She is an intimidating blocker and has the highest hitting percentage on her team.

This is how Wisconsin volleyball fans know the starting middle blocker and Cary, North Carolina native Haleigh Nelson. However, there is a more substantial person to this proficient hitter than meets the eye.

“She’s a lighthearted kid that takes what she does seriously, but doesn’t take herself too seriously,” head coach Kelly Sheffield said with a grin. “She’s somebody that people want to be around. She sees the positive things in life and in people.”

Sheffield also mentioned that Nelson wants to enjoy whatever she is doing and always comes to the gym high-spirited each day for practice, and that she has improved immensely over the past two seasons that he has coached her.

This playful yet hardworking starting sophomore middle blocker currently holds the team’s best hitting percentage, but according to Sheffield, this is not something that happened overnight.

“Early on last year, she was in 10th gear on a 10-speed bicycle, where you’re pedaling really, really fast, but you’re not really going that fast, but she was trying,” Sheffield said. “Now she’s blocking a lot of balls. We set her in big points in big moments. She’s an offensive threat, she’s one of our best servers and she’s an improving defensive player.”

Last season, Nelson finished out a solid first year fifth on the team with an average of 1.74 kills per set. Now, halfway through this campaign, she has steadily improved and has the third best kills per set average on the team with 2.29.

But arguably even more crucial than her improvements in hitting, which has seen her attack percentage jump 81 points, are her gains on the service line. After finishing her freshman season without any service aces, Nelson now sits fourth on the team with 10 service aces this year.

Throughout her growth and transformation into a key component for the Badgers’ offense, Nelson stated that she has not forgotten who she is and certainly does her best to show her true colors during matches.

“A lot of times I’ll try to bring my personality out on the court when we celebrate, because that’s what makes the game fun for me,” Nelson said. “As much as I take it seriously, I also take it lightly. This is really fun to me, and it means a lot, but it means a lot in a whole bunch of different ways.”

Last year as a freshman, it did not take long for Nelson’s comfortable personality and sense of humor to shine through toward her teammates. Nelson said that her former teammate Crystal Graff created a twitter account called “Quotes by Haleigh” where Graff and the rest of the team would tweet funny and amusing phrases that Nelson said on a daily basis.

(About farts): "the loud ones are the funniest…cause they make noise!" #smallthingsinlife

— Quotes by Haleigh (@quotesbyhaleigh) September 6, 2013

"You know it's a good day when ur middle school crush favorites ur tweet." #blushing

— Quotes by Haleigh (@quotesbyhaleigh) December 15, 2013

"There's not enough degrees outside right now." #burrrr #wintersacoming

— Quotes by Haleigh (@quotesbyhaleigh) November 24, 2013

At Michigan State: "How dare they serve brats?!" #thatsourthang

— Quotes by Haleigh (@quotesbyhaleigh) November 22, 2013

“They’re real life, that’s for sure,” Nelson said as she smiled.

Nelson expressed that she is glad that she ended up at Wisconsin, but choosing to be a Badger was not a cut-and-dry decision for her.

After she completed her final club volleyball tournament in Columbus, Ohio, during her junior year of high school, the Wisconsin coaching staff unexpectedly approached Nelson. Early that season, Wisconsin coaches informed Nelson that they were not looking for any middle blockers. Apparently, some plans had changed in Nelson’s favor, as the coaches expressed their interest in her as a player, and asked her to come tour their program.

“I was blind-sighted. It was out of left field that they had an opening,” Nelson said. “I had been waiting all this time, and then all of a sudden this opportunity was just thrust upon me, and I was blessed that I even had the opportunity to visit.”

Less than a week later, Nelson boarded a plane and headed to Wisconsin’s training camp where the coaches further scouted her and her abilities as an athlete.

A few weeks later, former head coach Pete Waite offered Nelson a spot on the team, which she accepted days later. The time span from the period that Nelson met the coaching staff to when she committed to Wisconsin lasted less than a month.

Nelson said she is a very careful person and does not usually make quick decisions, but for some reason she was certain that Wisconsin was the place that she wanted to play volleyball.

“I am so lucky to be here. I love this place,” Nelson said. “It was destiny for me to end up here, as weird as that sounds. It was just such an unusual turn of events that got me here. It’s just incredible.”