LCHS senior Grace Bossingham chooses Lincoln College for volleyball and academics

[April 19, 2018] 

Lincoln native Grace Bossingham has decided to stay close to home. The Lincoln Community High School senior made her choice official on Tuesday evening in front of family and friends as she signed a letter of intent to attend Lincoln College and play volleyball.

After giving it much consideration, the standout middle hitter who was a member of the Lady Railers volleyball team for four years, made her decision and all those surrounding her Tuesday night were full of smiles.

A family full of support for Grace.  Her immediate family features brother Griffin and mom Angie and dad Nate.  In the back row are her aunt Liz Hays, cousins Ava and Drake and grandmothers Mary Hays and Mary Bossingham.

"It was just close to home," said Bossingham, who also attended Lincoln Junior High School. "My family lives here and I didn't want to leave them. I like playing volleyball, so I didn't want to stop playing volleyball to go somewhere else."

Bossingham plans to major in Special Education, a major that is not offered yet at Lincoln College, but with the school now making the transition to a four-year university that could be a possibility in the future.

Lincoln College Volleyball Coach Mark Tippett is familiar with Bossingham and he likes what he sees. "I've known of Grace's ability for a while as some of our current players that are from Lincoln know her and certainly spoke highly of her ability. I've seen her play before and I know she's a good quality hitter.

Bossingham is surrounded by her new Lady Lynx teammates following her signing with Lincoln College.

“We were definitely in need of more middles for our program. We have two returning middles that will play for our varsity. But for our JV program that we are developing, we started from scratch so we needed everything.

Grace Bossingham is surrounded by her parents Nate and Angie as she signs on to play volleyball at Lincoln College.

"In the fall when I did my recruiting I only had one player coming in on the roster that had middle experience. So when Grace showed interest in the school, I was very excited about that because having another middle who can come in and I know make an impact, it helps not only the JV but also adds depth to our Varsity roster.

“It's scary to go into a season with only two middles because if one of them has an issue then suddenly we're really scrambling at other positions. It's nice to know we've got another player coming in that's a good offensive player that knows how to play the position. She's going to get great experience I think with our JV and I also see some time with our Varsity."

Coach Tippett also made mention of the advantages of signing a local player. "We also love to have local players choose to stay here at Lincoln College. We know they are going to have family support, we know that they are going to be kids that are familiar with the area and aren't going to have the culture shock of going away to a town. It just makes a lot of things easier. We really like to have local players who want to stay and play at home."

Bossingham joins fellow LCHS senior Morgan Lolling on the volleyball team and the two will also be reunited with LCHS grad Kaylyn Hoffert, who will be a junior at Lincoln College.

In the fall, Lincoln College will begin competing at the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA) level of sports competition.

[Teena Lowery]