The hardest class to write about in August

That is the most in the Class of 2028 and close to the most by anybody in the country regardless of class, and she does it as a right side who also plays some setter, which mostly means her coach could not find a rotation where she was worth taking off the floor. New Albany is 16-6 and ranked fifth in Mississippi, and its setter, Sara Barton Ozbirn, has 505 assists.

The junior class is the hardest of the four to write about in August, and the reason is arithmetic. Seniors have three full seasons behind them. Sophomores and freshmen are new enough that a big August number is itself the news. Juniors are in between, around long enough that nobody treats them as a discovery and not long enough that the recruiting picture has settled.

So we went at it geographically, and the class looks different when you do.

Utah, Texas and the two ends of a sample

Annie Cronauer at Wasatch in Heber City, Utah is hitting .504. Not .404. She has 67 kills and 12 blocks and leads the Wasps in three categories on a 5-2 team ranked twelfth in Utah. That is the highest hitting percentage we found anywhere in the country today, in any class.

The biggest defensive season in this class belongs to Makayla Escobedo at Madison in San Antonio, who has 495 digs and 370 receptions for a team that is 8-20. She is two digs behind the national leader, who is a senior — that race is a piece of its own today. Leyton Minnix at Crawford is behind her with 469 at 8.1 per set, the best rate of the three, for a 21-5 team. Ainsley Anderson, also at Crawford, has 561 assists and leads the Pirates in hitting percentage, which is a genuinely strange thing for a setter to do and suggests she is dumping and tipping into a lot of open floor.

Kate McGough at Hebron in Carrollton has 269 kills at 4.0 per set for a 21-6 team. Blaire Sexton at Lake Creek has 245.

Nine states, one graduation year

Ashari Jenkins at Briarcrest Christian in Eads, Tennessee has 72 kills for a team that is 9-2 and ranked fifth in the state, and her teammate Allison Floyd has 232 assists.

Sarah Vandersea at Carrboro in North Carolina has 84 kills for an 8-2 team. Brooke Williams, who plays libero and outside for that same programme, appears in six of the ten categories Carrboro publishes and leads it in digs, digs per set and receptions. Camille Rucker sets it, with 184 assists.

Camilla Villarreal at Albuquerque High leads the Bulldogs in hitting percentage and receptions — on a page whose totals reconcile to roughly four sets, so read that as a start rather than a season. Carolina Walker at Jackson Prep in Mississippi leads the Patriots in kills, kills per set and hitting percentage at .304. Chloe Stechschulte at Juan Diego Catholic in Draper, Utah appears in nine of the ten categories her school publishes, which nobody else in this class does.

Boyana Pesic at Bishop Gorman in Las Vegas leads the Gaels in kills and hitting percentage through a 3-0 start. Abby Marizcurrena at Boerne-Champion has 66 kills for a 15-3 team. Sophie Taylor at Northwest Rankin in Mississippi has 214.

Nine states, and the only thing connecting them is a graduation year.

Class of 2028 production, by category

Category	No.	Athlete	Pos	High school	State	Total	Source
kills	1	Allie Keller	RS/S	New Albany	MS	369	School page
kills	2	Rylan Newbrough	OH/MH	Andrews	TX	302	Class board
kills	3	Ann Flemming LeFlore	OH	East Union, Blue Springs	MS	270	Class board
kills	4	Kate McGough	OH	Hebron, Carrollton	TX	269	School page
kills	5	Aleah Edmond	OH/RS	Flower Mound	TX	261	Class board
kills	6	Hannah Griffin	OH	Liberty Hill	TX	249	Class board
kills	7	Rivers Dedeaux	OH	Sumrall	MS	247	Class board
kills	8	Blaire Sexton	OH/RS	Lake Creek, Montgomery	TX	245	School page
kills	9	Sophie Taylor	OH	Northwest Rankin, Flowood	MS	214	Class board
kills	10	Deja Carroll	OH	Weiss, Pflugerville	TX	210	Class board
kills	11	Olivia Kitur	OH/OPP	Allen	TX	208	Class board
kills	12	Ella Dehart	OH/MH	Armuchee, Rome	GA	207	Class board
kills	13	Maggie Wheeler	OH	Lake Travis, Austin	TX	197	Class board
kills	14	Piper Adair	OH	McCallum, Austin	TX	196	Class board
kills	15	Aleciara Smallwood	S/OH	Cuero	TX	192	Class board
kills	16	Makayla Ladner	OH/DS	West Harrison, Gulfport	MS	190	Class board
kills	17	Carinne Bouie	MH	Goose Creek Memorial, Baytown	TX	189	Class board
kills	18	Blair Smith	OH	Mount St. Mary, Oklahoma City	OK	183	Class board
kills	19	Kate Starr	OH/RS	Edmond North, Edmond	OK	178	Class board
kills	20	Sarah Vandersea	OH	Carrboro	NC	84	School page
kills	21	Ashari Jenkins	OH	Briarcrest Christian, Eads	TN	72	School page
kills	22	Annie Cronauer	MB	Wasatch, Heber City	UT	67	School page
kills	23	Carolina Walker	OH/RS	Jackson Prep, Jackson	MS	67	School page
kills	24	Abby Marizcurrena	OH	Boerne-Champion, Boerne	TX	66	School page
assists	1	Ainsley Anderson	S	Crawford	TX	561	School page
assists	2	Sara Barton Ozbirn	S	New Albany	MS	505	School page
assists	3	Allison Floyd	S	Briarcrest Christian, Eads	TN	232	School page
assists	4	Camille Rucker	S	Carrboro	NC	184	School page
digs	1	Makayla Escobedo	DS/L	Madison, San Antonio	TX	495	School page
digs	2	Leyton Minnix	L/DS	Crawford	TX	469	School page
digs	3	Kyleigh Shaw	S	Madison, San Antonio	TX	363	School page
digs	4	Brooke Williams	L/OH	Carrboro	NC	80	School page
hitting %	1	Annie Cronauer	MB	Wasatch, Heber City	UT	.504	School page
hitting %	2	Camilla Villarreal	OH/DS	Albuquerque	NM	.324	School page
hitting %	3	Carolina Walker	OH/RS	Jackson Prep, Jackson	MS	.304	School page
hitting %	4	Boyana Pesic	OH/S/DS	Bishop Gorman, Las Vegas	NV	.250	School page

Two things worth saying out loud

The first is that the top of this class is concentrated in Mississippi and Texas the way every August board is, because those states have played forty to sixty more sets than everybody else. By Halloween the shape of this list will be different.

The second is that the bottom two thirds of this page are not lesser players. They are players in states that started later, at schools that report carefully, in programmes that will be very good in October. Cronauer hitting .504 in Utah across seven matches is not a smaller achievement than 200 kills in Texas across twenty-five. It is a different sample.

On the cusp

Annie Cronauer (Wasatch UT), Brooke Williams (Carrboro NC), Chloe Stechschulte (Juan Diego Catholic UT), Carolina Walker (Jackson Prep MS), Camilla Villarreal (Albuquerque NM).

Five juniors in five states that will not lead a national board this month, all of them leading their own programs in multiple categories, none of them carrying a star tier with us.

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*Stats as of Aug. 31, 2026.