|
|||
|
|||
|
 |
|
|
UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN VOLLEYBALL MEDIA CONFERENCESeptember 8, 2014Kelly SheffieldTHE MODERATOR: We have head coach Kelly Sheffield. COACH SHEFFIELD: Started out with a tough Northern Colorado team, got on them in game one. I think we saw a team that was pretty winded starting game two. I think in hindsight they got on us a little bit. That was probably to be expected. We stopped transitioning as hard as what we needed to. When you don't transition hard, you don't put quite as much into the ball as probably what you should. They were just digging everything up. The longer the rallies went, the more fatigued we got. We were kind of in a battle there. We talked to the team afterwards about you've got to be able to transition hard. Saturday morning we played Florida A&M, got all our healthy kids in the ballgame. It wasn't a match that we played particularly well. A lot of lineups we haven't spent a lot of time training. The kids that were getting an opportunity, frankly they didn't play that well. The match went on a little longer than what it probably should have. The night match against Colorado State, I think we played one of the best defensive teams in the country. This is a really, really solid team. They had 7,000 fans there, all‑time high. Really great environment, great crowd. I thought our kids rose up to the occasion. I thought we played really, really well. Courtney Thomas had a monster entire weekend. Kelli Bates showed a lot of progress from week one to week two. She was our best passer in the match. Taylor Morey defensively was really, really good. I thought Lauren had a really, really good match. It was a great team effort against a really quality opponent. We're excited about this weekend coming back home. We're hoping that we're able to pack our place, just like the place we just left was full for us. We're hope our fans will show up and pack the Field House. We're excited about being home. THE MODERATOR: Questions. Q. After the first two weekends, do you have a sense there's a target on your back from the standpoint the opponents are going to bring all their best stuff because of last year? COACH SHEFFIELD: Oh, yeah. I mean, people are promoting our match. There's a different hype, you can tell that. But we want to be one of those programs who does it consistently. You can certainly tell, you can definitely tell how people are marketing our matches. As far as the play, you think you're getting everybody's best shot every night no matter what you're ranked. But, yeah, there's enthusiasm on the road, that's for sure. Q. What kind of emotions will there be Friday night when you unveil the runner‑up banner? COACH SHEFFIELD: I don't know if there will be a whole lot of emotion, to tell you the truth. Maybe it makes for a better story if we weep, hug each other, things like that. We're pretty deep into our own season right now. It's pretty much the same cast of characters we had a year ago. It's not a reunion. You don't have a bunch of former players coming back for that. What we are, we're excited about sharing that with the fans because we haven't been able to do that. You drop that, you hope that they get excited for it, then you get back to the business of competing against a really good Miami team. Q. Lauren obviously made a lot of impact last year. What do you see the second time around from her as far as her progression as a setter compared to a freshman? COACH SHEFFIELD: We were at the airport yesterday. I showed her her offensive stats. A year ago she had about a hundred. Now she's about 625 according to our stats. I think the media have her at 500 or something. Offensively she's different. The plays that she's running, the progressions, what she's seeing on the other side of the net is totally different. She's a very skilled setter. I'm not sure there's a lot of differences as far as that. There are some nuances. Her and I had a video session early this morning. Her set choices are a lot different. She was a player, when she ran forward, she would set back. When she would run back, she would set forward. When she would be coming off the net, she set quick. There was some predictability with that, even though she could make some fantastic sets. Where she set was kind of predictable. She's very, very unpredictable right now in a lot of cases. She's speeding up the offense a lot more. That's one reason you're seeing Courtney and Ellen hitting for higher percentages because we're able to run our tempo a lot quicker. Q. Each player and coach that was a part of last year's run will look at the banner and think about something different. What do you think will be the first thing that comes to your mind? COACH SHEFFIELD: I don't know if there really will be. Last year just isn't in our vocabulary. It is when we're asked about it. The only time we're asked about it is when we're talking with somebody who is going to report on where things are right now and you want this comparison. I think the biggest thing about that group is that every week we got better. As a coach, as a fan, anybody that follows the program, when you see a group of people that are getting better on a weekly basis, that makes it a lot more fun. It's incredibly special because it doesn't happen that much. That's probably the thing I respected most about that group. Are we able to do that? I would say from week one to week two this season, we were better in week two than what we were in week one. What I'd like to see is are we able to be better in week three than we were this past week. Other than that, I'm not sure. I'm going to be trying to figure out how we're going to get our middles going, are we going to communicate, serve tough enough. Those will probably be the emotions that will be running and hoping it doesn't take too long because we just got done warming up. I don't know. That's not a sexy answer, but it's probably the truth. Q. What do you see from Ellen? Her numbers jump off the page. Last year she was a player that admitted at one point in her career she was mentally checked out, now pretty awesome. COACH SHEFFIELD: She's putting up first and second team All‑American numbers right now. Is she able to do that over the course of the season, that's her challenge, the one she's embracing. There's an urgency with Ellen that she's probably never had in her life. I don't think you'd ever see the word 'urgency' with Ellen Chapman ever. There's certainly an urgency with how she trains. It's coming out in the matches as well. She's a very confident player. When things were a little bit dicey on Friday night, she was, Everybody get on my shoulders. It wasn't just her numbers showing that, it was her whole being, her spirit. There was a drive that if she continues that, she keeps growing on that, man, she's in for a special season. Q. Annmarie Hickey was very good last year. Morey obviously put up some pretty good numbers. But she seems to be doing pretty well so far. COACH SHEFFIELD: The Colorado State match, she was a stud. 21 digs after two sets, that's ridiculous. Usually you see that many digs, you look and the hitting percentages are down. A lot of digs, people are hitting 120. No offense. Both teams were really offensively pretty good. She read great. She was under control. She's got the ability to be a special player for us. When there's big crowds and big matches, she usually plays really, really well. That was kind of going back to Kelli Bates. A couple weeks ago I asked her what was the biggest crowd she ever played in front of in her life, and it was right after we had that open practice, we had about 800 people here for open practice. She said 50. She had more people watching her during her serve and pass than she did at any high school or club match. So the other night she's playing in front of a pretty packed arena. She was really good. I mean, there's no fear in her. Apparently we have another kid that likes the big stage. THE MODERATOR: Thanks, Kelly. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
|
||||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
About ASAP Sports •
FastScripts Archive •
Recent Interviews •
Captioning •
Upcoming Events •
Contact Us
FastScripts | Events Covered | Our Clients | Other Services | ASAP in the News | Site Map | Job Opportunities | Links |
|
ASAP Sports, Inc. | T: 1.212 385 0297
|