Story courtesy of Bowling Green's Athletic Communications Department

Every year, Bowling Green Volleyball begins the season with its Dream BiG event for fans and donors, complete with a list of auction items. One fan-favorite for the last few years has been a specific baked good donated to the auction. The favoritism isn’t necessary because of what is made, although they are fantastic every year, but more so because of who made it.

Senior setter Amanda Otten has had an impressive career on the volleyball court for the Falcons over the last three seasons. A rising senior, Otten has already entered the BGSU record book on multiple occasions, including entering this season seventh during the program’s Rally Scoring Era for career assists with 2,333. She’s been named MAC Setter of the Week four times, MAC Offensive Player of the Week once, and in 2024 was First Team All-MAC with 1,179 assists and 38 aces, both stats entering the program’s single-season top 10 for the Rally Scoring Era.

However, like all Falcons, Otten has her eyes set on her life beyond Bowling Green as well. A passion hobby that began during COVID has turned into a career path that Otten sees as not only an opportunity for life after volleyball, but something she can do right now.

The first year with Dream BiG set the stage for Otten to begin her business while still attending college and playing volleyball for Bowling Green. What began as an Instagram page soon grew into a website to place orders, including cupcakes, cakes, cookies and brownies, as well as receiving help from teammates.

“I created my website, which was actually a year ago, and I had one of my teammates [Edyta Waclawczyk] help make business cards,” said Otten.

But the support from the volleyball team goes beyond just teammates assisting with business cards, and occasionally with orders; it includes a support system from the coaches themselves who have invested in the passions of the players off the court.

“[The coaches] want us to succeed outside of volleyball. Being able to have coaches that not only care about us from a volleyball standpoint, but they want us to be successful in life and be good people. It’s just really nice to have leaders and coaches that really want to listen to you and understand you.”

That community of coaches and leaders has been a driving point in Otten finding her career beyond volleyball. Majoring in business, Bowling Green’s Schmidthorst College of Business has helped Otten pair her passion for baking with knowledge that will be the building blocks to her future.

“I like my major because I have to take one class of every branch of business. Accounting, stats, business analytics- we have to take all of it. I think knowing the way business works in every way is really helpful.”

Pairing the well-rounded business experience with her passion has led Otten to see herself in the baking industry beyond Bowling Green.