(VB) Ongoing Volleyball Thread

It’ll have to start with the basics, imo: good service game, good passing game, good blocking game with good technique. Good attitude too.

 

ET you got my 2nd bacon in 5 years. No coach in VB is on a hot seat Big Red was and is the heart and soul of this team last year and this year. Muff is doing everything she can but there was a reason she played on a mid level D2 team. No D1 setter was going to transfer here to sit on the bench all year.
The only way this team gets above.500 in the SEC is if Kennedy takes over and pilots the ship. Unfortunately, very few Freshman are that assertive. While I love Ellie, that is not her personality. Rarely if ever do you see a DS or Libero take over a team. The only one I can think of at UF was CK. The Stanford Libero 2 years ago was the other. Enjoy what's left of the season and get ready for a super 2024!

 

Imo Elle was the best Libero nationally, I saw, her freshman year. In the fwiw category…..

 

It's fine to disagree. However, I didn't say any coach was on the hot seat, just used it as an example for where I see this team.

Injuries have done in this team along with any championship chances. It is my intention to watch and enjoy what is left of the season as I know and have documented in this thread that the future is bright. I just don't share the rosy expectations of others for the remainder of the 2023 season.

 

Is it time to think about going another direction in leadership?

 

Absolutely not, IMO. This team had the talent and chemistry to compete for a national title this year, but lost the best setter in the nation and a freshman star outside hitter to injury early in the season. Mary Wise had no control over that and a volleyball team just can't compensate for devastating losses like that. UF Volleyball is not like our soccer program under Becky Burleigh, where recruiting started lagging way behind other SEC schools and the style of play got outdated, with the program slipping from dominance to irrelevance. Gator Volleyball is recruiting and competing at a high level every year and Mary Wise is still on top of her game in all respects.

 

100% agree here.. with NIL and transfer portal it only gets harder to get back up setters unless you are running a 6-2 which is hardly going to be ran with a setter like Stucky.
This is the first time I’ve gone back and replayed the games from the MSU loss. Muff is giving it her all but blocking that right side with her height and having to deal with the most athletic players on the court (usually). You are just going to see teams go over her block, tool the block, around the block and nothing against her as a person or player but her tempo and ball placement puts the hitters in trouble quite a bit. It is what it is. Keep grinding

 

I didn't know wing was such a big fan of Gator VB.

 

I usually watch the games with my 13yo daughter. She was at Disney with friends on Friday night, so I asked her on Saturday if she was ready to watch the game, and she gave me a depressed look, which let me know that we lost. She didn't watch but saw that we lost 1-3 in her TikTok feed or something. At least not watching that loss kept my blood pressure level. I hope we turn things around. It's like a plane flying high at 30K feet and losing an engine and having to make an emergency landing. Not getting to our intended destination.

 

TIFWIIW
Elli has another year of eligibility, but no one is sure she will come back.
I love Elli but follow the money.

Probably this is the answer: If you think Elli is coming back you don't
know Jac.

 

Becky also has a Natty

 

playing devil's advocate most likely not w/o abby and danielle, just saying major talent, in this case world class talent, helps.

 

Yep, but that was in her 4th year - 1998. Burleigh hung around and was allowed to hang around many years too long and the program went to crap during the last 5-6 years of her tenure. 1 National title doesn't come closing to measuring up to the 25 SEC titles, 8 Final 4's, 2 National Runners-Up and the 33 year consistent excellence of Mary Wise. In spite of not having a national title, I would rank Mary Wise & Mike Holloway as the 2 greatest coaches in Gator history.

 

andi brandie,sp? might be a close 3rd

 

just lost the first set to A@M, hard to believe they were a half set away from sweeping wisconsin and being no.1, now lucky to be top 25.1 individual cannot be that important for this to happen, it has been what, a month?something else must be going on.

 

Well it can’t be the coaching…..

 

Could have done without letting the Ags back in this set

 

All right, they got this!

 

Gators win 3-1.

 

Gators beat a hot Aggies team on the road 3-1, dominating set 4 25-12. Not lucky to be top 25 at all.