Kari Miller-Ortiz and the late Edgar Laforest are among the eight Olympic and Paralympic players who will be inducted into the USA Volleyball Hall of Fame at the annual banquet and ceremony on May 24 at the Omni Hotel in Dallas, Texas.
The Hall of Fame ceremony is a celebration volleyball’s greatest athletes, coaches, officials and leaders.
Three-time Paralympic libero (2008, 2012, 2016) Miller-Ortiz, who won the gold medal at the Rio 2016 Paralympics and silver at Beijing 2008 and London 2012 will be inducted as the All-Time Great Female Sitting Athlete.
Outside hitter Edgar Laforest, who competed at Rio 2016 and medalled at the Para Pan American Games three times (one gold and two silver medals) and worked as a referee before passing away in 2020, will be inducted as the All-Time Great Male Sitting Athlete.
World ParaVolley Board member and ParaVolley Pan America president Joe Campbell was named as this year’s recipient of the Glen G. Davies Referee Service Award, which recognises active USA National Referees for outstanding contributions to the USA Volleyball referee’s development and certification programme.
The award was named in honour of Glen G. Davies, who at the time of this conferral by the Board of Directors, was the only FIVB arbiter to have been selected to officiate as a referee in four consecutive Olympic Games (1968-1980), and twice as the first referee in a gold medal match. He is a former national chairman of referees and a referee-emeritus.
“I am constantly surprised (yet I should not be) about the quality of people who volunteer and participate in the World ParaVolley community. The 2023 Inductees for the USA Volleyball Hall of Fame, Kari Miller-Ortiz and Edgar Laforest, and Service Award recipient Joe Campbell, have collectively done great things over many years for USA Volleyball and also for World ParaVolley. I congratulate them on being honoured by the USA Volleyball Hall of Fame and thank them sincerely for their service to ParaVolley.”
– World ParaVolley President Barry Couzner OAM