FREEPORT — Diane Geist's volleyball career began on a dare.

When Geist was a junior at Freeport High School, she and her friend, sophomore Carol Perroz, dared each other to go out for the volleyball team.

Geist curled her lip and initially balked, but decided a challenge was a challenge.

“I said, 'OK, I'll do it if you do it,'” Geist said. “I just thought volleyball was kind of a (wimpy) sport.”

Turns out Geist was a natural at it and she quickly grew to love it.

Two years later, the 1979 Freeport graduate was excelling as a setter at Indiana (Pa.) University.

Little did she know at the time, a long career in volleyball was burgeoning — one that is still going strong today.

Geist, who has spent more than three decades as the volleyball coach at Knoch, will be inducted into the Armstrong County Sports Hall of Fame because she took that dare so many years ago.

“I think at the time probably basketball was my first love,” Geist said. “I always played softball. You have to remember, there were no little leagues, no junior high sports for girls back then. I had to learn everything in high school.

“When I went to college, I didn't feel very confident about trying out,” Geist added. “I missed one of the tryouts and then I was walking on campus one day and the senior captain of the team recognized me and stopped me. She asked me, 'Where were you?' I was surprised she knew who I was, so I went and tried out.”

Geist got her degree in fine arts from IUP in 1983 and then went back to school a few years later to earn her teaching certificate.

Geist recently retired after a long tenure as an art teacher at Knoch.

What she hasn't left behind is volleyball.

For 33 seasons, Geist has guided the Knights. Successful seasons piled up but there was always something missing.

A WPIAL title.

That finally came in 2017. A PIAA crown came shortly after it.

Two more WPIAL championships have followed, including one last fall.

“It was satisfying, but I felt that more for the players,” Geist said. “You have to get the right group at the right time. You have to have the right combination of athletes and talent and you have to have a little bit of luck.”

While the wins stick out for Geist, she said the relationships she has formed in the sport have stuck out even more.

“I look at the big picture. I have a ton of former players who have friend requested me (on Facebook), so they still want to talk to me and that's good — when I first started I was not an easy coach. I've mellowed a lot since then,” Geist said.

Geist almost walked away from coaching in 1999.

She was growing more and more frustrated with being lumped into the same section with big schools in the WPIAL because there were only two volleyball classes.

“It was getting tough and I was just about ready to hang it up,” Geist said.

But in 2000, the state expanded two to three classes and Knoch was no longer lumped into the same section with the perennial titans.

Geist decided to stay on as coach.

She has no plans to walk away now, either.

“Everyone asks if I'm going to quit this year — you're graduating nine seniors,” Geist said. “I still like to coach. I'm missing it right now because I coach the middle school team and they're not in school. It's really like starting from scratch, but I enjoy watching the improvement they make.”