Jessica Mendoza began at Lake-Sumter in 2023 as the assistant coach of the beach volleyball team, having 14 years of beach experience, as well as, 17 years of indoor experience. Before moving back home to Florida, Jessica was living in California while pursuing her career of coaching and facilitating tryouts as the Assistant Manager of the USA Beach Volleyball High Performance Program. This program bridges the gap between our USA National Teams and youth volleyball programs across the country. This is done through a system of national tryouts, which then qualify athletes for training programs and the USA Youth and Junior National Teams. While working, Jessica also competed professionally in the AVP circuit and competed for the USA Elite 8 Under 26 team.

Prior to her professional career, Jessica was a four-year letter winner and 3-time state champion in volleyball at Winter Park High School. She also competed and coached club at the Orlando Volleyball Academy, while also qualifying for the Junior Olympics during her high school career.

Following her high school accolades, Jessica garnered first team all-state and all-conference honors from playing her first year of Indoor Volleyball at Broward college. After her first season, Jessica was recruited for another full scholarship to play OH/L at Saint Leo University in 2010-11. While attending school at SLU on the west coast of Florida, Jessica caught wind of Beach Volleyball making its way into collegiate athletics. She was then recruited to play D1 indoor and beach volleyball at Florida International University in Miami, Florida.

While at FIU, Jessica was honored with Panther’s MVP award in 2012-2014 while representing her team in the ‘Best of The Rest’ AVCA National Pairs Tournament. Jessica and her partner Maryna Samoday placed 3^rd at the National Tournament in 2012-2013. Jessica graduated in 2014 with the Dean’s Honor award for her outstanding academics. She was accepted into the USA Beach program where she decided to move and compete professionally in California from 2014-2016 and 2019-2021.

Jessica decided to make her way back home for family and to pursue her passion for coaching and mentoring. She began to start one of the only beach volleyball clubs at that time in 2016-2018 in Orlando, Florida where she coached and trained both beach and indoor athletes on the sand. She helped many of her athletes continue their volleyball journey with collegiate scholarships for both sand, indoor, and academics.

To this day Jessica still gives back to the sport by coaching at Lake Sumter and coaching privates for both sports, all ages. Jessica is now living her dream of owning and operating her 5-acre farm with her boyfriend, Mitchell, in Eustis, Fla.