Local volleyball team goes for gold

By Jennifer Pierce, NEWS 9

OKLAHOMA CITY -- The Paralympics begin in September, and one local women's volleyball team is going for the gold.

Volleyball is a physically demanding sport, but try doing it without leaving the ground.

Sitting volleyball is all upper body. It's a mental challenge in moving and challenges are nothing new to these women.

"A drunk driver ran into the back of us while we were leaving a Christmas party, so I lost both legs and the driver passed," Paralympic athlete Kari Miller said.

"About 17 years ago, I was run over by a John Deer riding lawnmower by my uncle. Just slipped right underneath it, pure accident," Brenda Maymon, a paralympic volleyball player said.

Two very different stories, two very different people, but Brenda Maymon and Kari Miller have a common goal. These women will represent the U.S. in the women's sitting volleyball competition in Beijing, China.

This is Maymon's second chance at gold.

"I was on the team for the Athens 2004 Paralympics, but this one is supposed to be bigger and better," Maymon said.

It's the opportunity athletes dream of and an occasion Miller said she wouldn't have had, had it not been for the moment that changed her life.

"When it changes, it changes in a positive manner. I'm in the Paralympics. I wouldn't have done that. I wouldn't have gone to Beijing," Miller said. "I wouldn't have seen half of the world I've seen and I wouldn't have been open to meet so many great people."

Oklahoma City will host the Sitting Volleyball World Championships in 2012.