Claire Carter’s national recognition is also a Queen’s volleyball story.
Queen’s own outside hitter has been named to Volleyball Canada’s NextGen roster this summer, adding another national opportunity to a career that has continued to grow in Kingston.
Carter, Comm ’27, is training with the program in Richmond, B.C. The NextGen program gives selected athletes a high-performance environment connected to Canada’s senior national team pathway.
For Carter, the opportunity follows previous experience with Volleyball Canada at the U21 level. Last summer, she represented Canada at the U21 NORCECA Pan American Cup in Costa Rica and the U21 FIVB World Championships in Indonesia.
Those experiences have changed how Carter views the pathway available to athletes competing in the OUA.
“I think sometimes going to an OUA level university, I thought it would maybe close off a bit more doors than I expected,” Carter said in an interview with The Journal. “Seeing how much Queen’s has developed me, it’s almost eye opening. [Playing in the] OUA does not mean you can’t go further than that.”
Carter’s rise has happened alongside one of Queen’s strongest recent seasons.
The Gaels finished the regular season 14-6, winning 10 of their final 11 games before entering the OUA playoffs. Queen’s then swept Guelph in the quarterfinals to reach the OUA semifinals, where its season ended in a four-set loss to Brock.
For Carter, the loss did not erase what the group had built.
She said last season stands out because of how close the team became, especially after dealing with difficult losses and injuries throughout the year. Carter also worked her way back from an injury and still finished as one of Queen’s most productive players.
She was named an OUA First Team All-Star after recording 241 points, 185 kills, a .293 hitting percentage, and the best aces per set rate in the conference.
When the NextGen email came through, Carter said she was at home with her family. She had been waiting for it all day.
“It was very rewarding because I know I came off an injury at Queen’s and I didn’t really know how much of an impact I’d be able to make later in the season,” Carter said. “I worked really hard to get back on the court and I think it paid off.”
That experience is also shaping what Carter wants to bring back to Queen’s.
At the national level, Carter said she learned how important it is to play with confidence, take risks, and not let mistakes control her game. She said that mindset helped her at Queen’s as well, where the team was able to build momentum through a long winning stretch late in the season.
Now, Carter hopes to bring more of that confidence into a leadership role.
“I’ve been told I’m a silent leader in the past and I kind of want to change that and be a little more vocal within our group,” she said. The Gaels will enter next season with both motivation and turnover. Carter said Queen’s will need younger players to step into larger roles after the departure of several seniors, but she believes the group is ready.
She said practices have already shown how competitive the younger players can be, and that many have started to understand the standard expected within the program.
Carter also pointed to the support around Queen’s women’s teams as something she hopes continues. She said a strong crowd can make a difference, especially in bigger games, and remembered last season’s senior night win over McMaster as a moment when support from other Queen’s athletes, such as the women’s rugby and men’s football teams, helped push them.
As the Gaels look to move beyond the OUA semifinals next season, Carter’s national experience gives Queen’s another example of how its athletes can develop within the program and still reach higher levels of the sport.
Tags
Claire Carter, Volleyball, Women's Volleyball
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