She might not have known at the time what her future destiny would be, but her coach at Barton, Wendee Saintsing, had a pretty strong feeling right from the start.

“Jenna was pretty much a natural coach,” Saintsing said. “She personally executed things on the court well and she was very helpful to others. Being the team leader that she was, it was natural for her to step into the position of coaching kids.”

While her career at Barton included multiple all-conference seasons and a role in leading Saintsing to her first conference title in volleyball, Hinton’s more lasting legacy has come in the years since she graduated in 1995.

Hinton has spent much of her post-Barton career coaching volleyball. Many of those years have been spent at the Triangle Volleyball Club, where she is teaching, mentoring and sharing her passion for volleyball with future standouts of the sport.

“Having my athletic experience at Barton is what has allowed me to work here at Triangle Volleyball Club,” Hinton said. “We’ve gone from having maybe three teams the first year I coached here to having 30 teams now. I was the first full-time employee here, so I’ve helped with all that growth. I’ve been able to watch it all and take part in it, and that’s been very exciting. I do attribute that to having a background in college athletics.

“They would not have hired someone who didn’t have the passion and drive to move in that direction. Because it was a big chance. When we opened the facility, there wasn’t anything else like it in the state. I left a job coaching at Louisburg College to take this job, and I really thought I would be hired here for about a year, we would not make any money and then I would have to go look for another job. That was in 2006 when we opened the facility, but we’re still going strong. We’ve expanded to seven courts. It’s kind of unbelievable when you think about it. When I was in high school, there wasn’t a true club opportunity for me to play. It just didn’t exist.”

Fortunately for Hinton, she had a high school coach to guide her, someone with whom she will now be sharing the distinction of Barton Hall of Famer.

“I went to Wake Forest-Rolesville High School, and one of the reasons I chose to go to Barton was that my coach is also in the Barton Athletic Hall of Fame,” she said. “Becky Pace Holder was a two-sport athlete, and she actually coached me in basketball and volleyball. She was very instrumental in helping many athletes – not just me – play college athletics. If it weren’t for her, I probably wouldn’t have even been aware of the opportunity. It just wasn’t even on my radar to play sports in college before meeting her.”

Hinton arrived on campus in 1991 and made an immediate impact that surprised even her.

“I didn’t have a whole lot of expectations coming in as a freshman, and I certainly didn’t think I would be playing and starting almost the entire season,” Hinton said. “I was just over-the-top with excitement, just having the time of my life. We had a great year – a three-way tie for first-place. We had some great matches against High Point and St. Andrews. It was just a really exciting, fun time for me.”

She emerged as team MVP in her sophomore season, and posted back-to-back all-conference seasons as a junior and senior.

“Jenna brought a lot of skills in, but she was so athletic,” Saintsing said. “She did things pretty naturally. She was very fluid out on the court. She got better and better during her four years here and really made an impact on our team and on the conference.”

For all her individual successes, what stands out for Hinton are the bonds she shared with teammates.

“The things that make all teams special are the people that you play with,” Hinton said. “My favorite memories of Barton are centered around playing on a team. I feel like if I didn’t have that team experience, something really big would have been missing from my life.

“I was proud to play on the team at Barton, I made great friends, learned a lot of good life lessons. The whole college experience is enriched when you have the opportunity to be a part of something like that.”

Now she is helping provide a similar opportunity to others through her coaching.

“She’s done an outstanding job through the years,” Saintsing said. “She knows what it takes to be successful. She’s a good role-model and has all the communication skills to be able to teach that to them as well as demonstrate it. With her experience, she has everything to offer them that they need.”

Over the last couple of years, Hinton has also been involved in helping bring the joys and benefits of volleyball to a different group of athlete. In doing so, she has finally been able to put that Barton biology degree to work as well.

In 2012, she collaborated with a local Paralympic sport club, Bridge II Sports, and the Duke University School of Engineering on a project that led to the design, development and production of a sitting volleyball chair that enables people with physical disabilities to play the sport of sitting volleyball.

“Through that, I’ve been able to work with a lot of current and former members of the military who have been wounded, and also with people in the community who have had physical disabilities,” Hinton said. “So I’ve gone in yet another direction. We’ve had a grass-roots effort here at our club to be more inclusive, and we’ve had a lot of programming centered around that.”

In recognition of her contributions to the growth and development of sitting volleyball in our region, Hinton was honored with the USA Volleyball Junior Club Director Award in 2013. She also was a presenting speaker at the USA Paralympic Conference, which is held annually at the USA Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, Colo.

“The really cool thing for me is every day of my life now, I get to coach and teach volleyball,” she said.