There aren't many things that Judy Green hasn't done on the volleyball court. From her collegiate playing career in the early days of the sport to her years of leading the Alabama Crimson Tide to the past decade as Thompson head volleyball coach, she has blazed new trails and set new standards in the game she loves.

That's what made 2025 so special.

After a decade of trying with her at the helm and 22 years of effort from Thompson's as a whole, the Warriors returned to the state championship match. They did so in the most dramatic way possible.

Just hours after beating perennial powerhouse Bayside Academy in the quarterfinals, Thompson gutted out a 15-12 fifth-set win by winning the final three points.

It was a match emblematic of the program's culture that Green established. Her team's refusal to quit even in the face of the greatest adversity took her to the state finals, and it elevated her to Shelby County Coach of the Year.

This award was no easy decision. Briarwood Christian's Chris Camper continued his impressive turnaround with the Lions, taking a team of mostly underclassmen and only three seniors between the last two years to the No. 1 ranking in Class 5A by beating numerous 7A and 6A teams and reaching the Final Four.

Spain Park's Justin Kisor won Class 6A Coach of the Year from the Alabama High School Volleyball Coaches Association for reaching the Final Four in just his second season with the Jags, maintaining the standard of success that previous coach Kellye Bowen established.

Chelsea's Jamie Gill took what was a major rebuilding year and made some serious noise. The Hornets were the only team to steal a set off Spain Park in area play, and they outlasted Pelham and Helena to make it back to Super Regionals, where they gave Spanish Fort a run for its money to begin their first-round match before falling to the Toros.

However, Green not only reached the highest heights of any team in the county, she created the identity that got every ounce of success out of this team and this season.

Entering the year, the Warriors battled the heartbreak and disappointment of missing out on regionals entirely thanks to an area semifinal loss to Hoover in 2024. That made them enter the offseason motivated to restore the standard of excellence to Thompson.

"They were very disappointed, and I think that once we spilled over into the offseason, you started to see that passion and that hunger to want to do better and to hold ourselves to the standard that we think Thompson volleyball should be, and that is we think we should be competing for a state championship," Green said.

It helped that the talent was maturing and converging at the right time for a deep run. Troy signee Kenzly Foote was back in her natural position of libero for her senior season, and rising star Maddy Henderson had a year under her belt in the offense to give her more comfort as a setter in addition to her powerful outside arm.

However, there were plenty of unknowns due to a lack of experience, including a newcomer from JV in middle blocker Brielle Merriweather and others like Jayla Green, Lauren Blackmon and Riley Lingo.

As is tradition, Green took the players on a preseason retreat during the summer to start forging those bonds early and establishing the tone for the year. This year's theme was finding their joy, which was embodied by a massive stuffed bear with a shirt that read "JOY" that the team carried along down the stretch.

Their ability to find a silver lining was tested from the second week of the season, where they went to five sets against Jasper and Helena on back-to-back days. They gutted out both victories, and Green later said that set the tone for the year.

Resilience became the backbone of the Warriors throughout 2025. They amassed a 4-2 record in five-set matches, with one coming from Hoover in regular season area play while the other was from Austin in the first seeding round of super regionals.

Green later pointed to the five-set loss to Hoover as the catalyst for the team's stretch run as they went to work and improved on their flaws in that match to ultimately beat the Bucs in four sets for the area title.

They carried that spirit through to the state tournament, where they needed four close sets to beat Bayside in the quarterfinals and five to get past Hewitt-Trussville, their second five-set meeting of the season.

In that match, Thompson faced deficits of 20-8 in the third set, 20-12 in the fourth set and 13-11 in the fifth set. The Warriors rallied each time, winning the third set 25-20 before getting the fourth set down to a 25-20 loss and claiming a 15-13 fifth-set win off a 3-0 closing run.

Green said that each five-set win built the team's confidence that they could go out and do it once again.

"We've been really good in five-set matches all year long, and that started when we played Jasper at home," Green said after the Final Four win. "We won that match right there, and every time that you win a five-set match, it builds your confidence. It's a make or break opportunity, right? And we have absolutely learned how to do that. We've learned how to win through the season."

After that match, Green leapt into her assistant coach's arms for a big hug, a release of joy that not only embodied the team's motto but was a release for years of work and effort to get to the finals.

Then, while seeing her team continuing to cry tears of joy after celebrating on the floor of the Birmingham CrossPlex, she sat down with crossed legs in a circle with the players, bringing herself down to their level to tell them that their emotions were just a byproduct of the journey it took them to get to the finals.

While they fell in the state championship, it was only to one of the most dominant teams in Alabama history, the McGill-Toolen Catholic Dirty Dozen, and they stole a marathon second set win while keeping each of the first three sets within striking distance.

Within the span of two days, they demonstrated both joy and resilience, the two traits that Green wanted her team to have. And while they fell short of their ultimate goal of winning a state championship, they made history in the process and raised the standard of the program in its milestone 50th year of existence.

"This has probably been the most enjoyable journey that I've had as a coach since I've been at Thompson," Green said after the finals. "This group of young women have brought joy every day to the practice floor. They brought joy in the locker room. They've brought joy during competition, and through that process, we grew into a team that had one fiber running through all of us. And you might bend us here and there, but you're never going to break us. So I'm extremely proud of them in what they've accomplished and how they represented Thompson High School and the city of Alabaster."

Her leadership at the helm of it all got every ounce of effort out of the Warriors to give them the best season in the program's modern history. They embodied a city's fighting spirit, and for that, she is the county's top coach.