Riverside Brookfield High School senior setter Claire Cameron often found herself in the corner of the school’s main gymnasium staring at the girls volleyball record board.
“I always just looked at it and studied the numbers in gym class,” Cameron said. “I just never thought I’d actually be able to get there and do it.”
Cameron has done just that. Twice. With her final match, Cameron’s 1,720 career varsity assists broke the mark of 1,711 by 1991 graduate Kary Law. Her late push included a single-match school-record 41 assists in a three-set loss to Fenwick, Oct. 14. That broke Law’s record of 40 in 1988.
“It’s something I’ve always wanted to do since I was a freshman,” said the 5-foot-7 Cameron, whose college volleyball plans are a club team at a larger school. “It means a lot because, even though I’m done with volleyball, I’m still a part of it in some way. Hopefully my name stays up there for a while, unless somebody beats me, but I think it’s just cool. It feels like I’m still in the sport because my name’s up there.”
Both records came as surprises, especially the career mark after the Bulldogs lost a 25-21, 21-25, 25-21 heartbreaker to York in the Class 3A York Regional semifinals, Oct. 28. Cameron had 36 assists.
The achievements also were gratifying for RBHS coach Caitlin Staib-Lipinski, who began as head coach in Cameron’s freshman year. She promoted her out of necessity midway through her freshman season but then immediately saw her ability to handle varsity competition.
“Claire has set the bar very high for a setter,” Staib-Lipinski said. “I think all of our players stepped up [against York]. They knew that Claire was close to that record and the team wanted to play better for her.”
Cameron was the first to acknowledge the hitting and passing of her teammates in achieving the records. This season, junior Mackenzie Sloger (259 kills) and senior Lucy Boyle (169 kills) and senior libero Ashlee Wudi (273 digs) were tops in those categories.
Cameron finished with 560 assists after a personal-best 624 in 2024. Law’s 755 assists for the 1988 Class AA state quarterfinalist remains the single-season school record.
Sloger helped Cameron keep track of her career assist total.
“I was like, ‘I don’t think I’m going to get (the record),’ Cameron recalled, and then, “‘I’m not going to get it.’ After our second to last game, we realized I only needed like 28 more. That’s when I realized maybe I could.”
The previous three seasons, she had four-year standout hitter Sofia Owens, now playing for the U. of Illinois club team, and liberos Aimee Di Battista, Kelley Tyler and Kira Conroy, who set single-match (34) and season (386) school records for digs in 2022.
“You can’t get an assist without a kill and that starts with a pass, so it all comes down to my teammates getting this with me,” Cameron said.
For the single-match record against 2A sectional champion Fenwick, the Bulldogs collected 44 team kills with a .304 attack percentage. Staib-Lipinski personally calculates the individual statistics from match recordings. She kept the single-match record secret until practice the next day but admitted her excitement that night while watching the replay.
“I came into practice and I wasn’t expecting anything,” Cameron said. “[Staib-Lipinski] said that I did beat the record. That was pretty cool, even though we lost.”
Cameron has played setter since her second-grade days of fall league with her mother as coach. Next was club volleyball at 1st Alliance. As a freshman, she began on junior varsity. Because of an injury on varsity, she was promoted as backup for a weekend tournament.
When Cameron played well during a test-run victory at Aurora Central Catholic, Staib-Lipinski asked her about staying on varsity during the bus ride back to RBHS.
“I remember getting scared because she was like, ‘Claire, get up here,’” Cameron recalled. “Deep down I didn’t want to leave the girls on JV but I knew it was a great opportunity to be varsity. I’m really glad I was on JV that small bit because I met a ton of girls.”
RBHS has won two straight Upstate Eight Conference East Division titles with a 6-0 record. Even as Staib-Lipinski increased the strength of the Bulldogs’ schedule, Cameron rose to the occasion in terms of decision making.
“That was one thing Claire was really good at from a setter’s perspective; there is no time to think,” Staib-Lipinski said.
Cameron laughed.
“I think it’s ironic because outside of volleyball I cannot make decisions,” Cameron said. “I’m looking at 19 schools and I have to narrow it down.”
Whichever Cameron chooses, most likely to study nursing, volleyball will never be the same.
“[I’ll miss] intense games in general. The feeling is euphoric in a way. I don’t know how I’m going to get my adrenaline that high again,” she said. “I could have played [college volleyball] if I wanted to, but when it comes down to it, I’d rather go to a larger school.”