The game brought us together.

The people made us NOLA.

NOLA Volleyball began in 2010 with three friends, one shared history, and a simple belief: this could be something special.

Julie Ibieta, Dana Launey, and Lauren Leaumont grew up playing volleyball in the New Orleans area before each continuing her career at Louisiana State University. Julie and Dana were teammates for the Tigers from 1988–1991, helping LSU win three SEC Championships and reach back-to-back NCAA Final Fours. Years later, Lauren followed a similar path, playing at LSU from 2003–2007.

Different generations. Same hometown. Same love for the game.

Eventually, volleyball brought the three of them together again—this time as coaches, mentors, and friends.

In 2010, they founded NOLA Volleyball in Metairie with the goal of creating the kind of club they believed young athletes in New Orleans deserved: a place where players could receive high-level training, compete against great competition, and pursue opportunities beyond Louisiana without losing the sense of community that makes New Orleans home.

Over the years, hundreds of young women have worn a NOLA jersey. They have traveled across the country together, competed on some of the biggest stages in junior volleyball, continued their careers at the collegiate level, and built friendships that lasted long after their final match.

But the measure of NOLA has never simply been wins, rankings, scholarships, or championships.

It has been the people.

It is the players who return to the gym years later.

The former NOLA athletes who become coaches.

The younger sisters who grow up watching their older sisters play and eventually put on a NOLA jersey of their own.

The families who spend countless weekends together in gyms across Louisiana and around the country.

And the relationships built through a game that brought three friends together in the first place.

That same philosophy has shaped Julie, Dana, and Lauren's work at Metairie Park Country Day School, where they have coached together for nearly two decades. Their Country Day teams have won an extraordinary 16 state championships in 17 seasons, creating one of the most successful high school volleyball programs in Louisiana history.

Yet through all of the championships, NOLA has remained rooted in the same principles on which it was founded: teach the game well, compete at a high level, expect commitment, care about your teammates, and help young women become confident in who they are.

Today, in the 2027 season, NOLA Volleyball enters a new chapter.

After helping build and lead the club from its earliest days, Dana Launey has made the decision to step back from her role as a director and devote more time to her family.

Her role may be changing, but her fingerprints are everywhere.

They are in the culture of the club.

In the coaches she has influenced.

In the players she has challenged and encouraged.

In the countless practices, tournaments, conversations, road trips, victories, disappointments, and memories that helped turn a small club started by three friends into the NOLA Volleyball family it is today.

And perhaps that is the best way to tell the story of NOLA.