University of Minnesota Athletics

VB: Erin Martin to Play Professional Volleyball in Puerto Rico

2/17/2005 12:00:00 AM | Volleyball

professionalFormer Minnesota volleyball standout Erin Martin (Ames, Iowa) has accepted an invitation to play professional volleyball for the Chicas de San Juan club in Puerto Rico. Martin becomes the second Golden Gopher in as many years to play professionally in Puerto Rico joining former teammate Cassie Busse.

Martin, who helped lead Minnesota to its first national championship appearance in school history this past season, finished second on the Golden Gophers' single-season kill list in 2004 at 695. She also set a school record for most total attempts in a single season with 1,750.

This past season, Martin was named an AVCA Honorable-Mention All-American, was named to the All-Region team and was First-Team All-Big Ten. She also was named to the NCAA Tournament Regional All-Tournament team for a second year in a row and was named to the Final Four All-Tournament team. Martin finished her career ranked No. 5 on the school's all-time kills list at 1,818 and fourth on the all-time solo blocks list at 124.

Martin is one of seven former Golden Gophers who is currently playing volleyball at the professional ranks. Busse, who played for the Corozal Pinkin Volleyball Club last year in Puerto Rico, is now playing in the same league for Isabella.

Lindsey Berg is currently playing professional volleyball in Italy, after becoming the first Minnesota volleyball player to play for the United States in the Olympics in 2004. Nicole Branagh is also currently playing professionally in Italy. Other former Golden Gophers that are playing volleyball professionally include Charnette Fair (Finland), Katrien DeDecker (Belgium) and Sonja Posthuma (Holland).

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