ORLANDO, Fla. -- The place is the same. The sounds, the intensity, the girls are all very familiar, but something has profoundly changed for Sarah Powers-Barnhard.
"Not like last year, worrying about him, where is he going to be, am I going to be on a court near him? That's all gone," said Powers-Barnhard.
More than twenty years after she and two other women testified before a USA Volleyball committee about the sexual abuse they say they endured at the hands of their coach Rick Butler, she no longer has to look over her shoulder while her team competes at the AAU Nationals in Orlando this week.
"I feel so much better. It's such a peaceful place for me to be now. I love this sport. I'm able to be here without the high emotion," said Powers-Barnhard.
Butler was one of the most powerful coaches in youth volleyball. Powers-Barnhard was 16 when she says he first raped her, allegations that are part of a federal lawsuit.
"How it happened was the same, isolation, abuse, you must follow me blindly or you will lose everything," said Powers-Barnhard.
For decades, Butler was untouchable, but over the past year, amid the national Me Too movement, the game has changed.
"I always tell people it's like turning the Titanic. It's very, very slow," said Powers-Barnhard.
For her this fight is now about one thing, keeping young athletes safe, not just in the arena, but in all arenas.
"It's not about us anymore. We're not going to sit and cry about what happened anymore. We know what happened. We've shared what happened. It's really about us fighting for present and future athletes," said Powers-Barnhard.
The first big victory for her came in January when USA Volleyball banned Butler for life.
"When that happened it was just a steamroll. That completely changed the volleyball arena. That's what we had hoped for. It was even better than what we hoped for," said Powers-Barnhard.
Weeks later the Amateur Athletic Union permanently banned him. Then the Junior Volleyball Association voted to "indefinitely suspend" him, and Disney, the home of the AAU Girls' Junior National Volleyball Championships, said Butler is no longer welcome.
"We're so pleased, and I speak for all of us victims, that the right people stepped up and said 'No more. We're not allowing it.' You don't know what that feels like to a victim. You feel so validated finally. You feel so appreciative finally," said Powers-Barnhard.
Butler's troubles don't end there. He, his wife and his club now face a federal lawsuit filed on behalf of the mother of one of his former players. The class action complaint alleges "Butler has sexually abused, as well as physically and emotionally abused, no fewer than six...underage girls in his care." The lawsuit claims they broke a consumer fraud law by not informing them about Butler's decades-old sexual abuse allegations.
The Butlers have filed a motion to have the lawsuit dismissed. In that motion, they say the plaintiff managed to plead nearly 50 pages of slanderous, disputed, and unsubstantiated allegations represented as facts.
Butler has never been charged with any crime and has denied the allegations.
By the time Powers-Barnhard came forward the statute of limitations for sexual abuse had expired.
"I do feel we're getting justice. Yes, I would have liked justice to show up a lot earlier, but I'm not going to be unhappy about the justice we've got in this past year. It's amazing," said Powers-Barnhard.
Having forced change in her own sport, she wants to see change in all sports, and she is in it for the long haul. If the past 23 years have proven anything, it's that Sarah Powers-Barnhard has endurance.
"I'll smile every time I go to a court and I see kids having fun, girls having fun and knowing is safer," said Powers-Barnhard.