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NCAA WOMEN'S VOLLEYBALL CHAMPIONSHIP

December 15, 2017

Kansas City, Mo.

THE MODERATOR: We welcome the Florida Gators, who enter the National Championship match with an overall record of 30-1 under the direction of head coach Mary Wise. Also joining us are student-athletes Rhamat Alhassan, Carli Snyder, and Caroline Knop. We'll start with opening comments from Coach Wise.

MARY WISE: Seems like we were just here, because I think we were just here. Shoot, at this point we feel so grateful that we have that extra day in between. Looking back at how challenging the regionals are to go back-to-back matches, so an opportunity to catch our breath from an emotional win last night and re-gear as the team did first thing this morning in preparing for playing this Nebraska team. They played great volleyball throughout the entire season, and we understand. It's a team that's low error, can point score from every position. Really, really good serve-pass team. They may have a few fans, maybe, cheering for them. But it's a great challenge, but this group has embraced challenges all year.

It's one of the things you keep hearing us use the word thrive. That was the theme that this senior group chose to represent our motto for this year. And they have lived that, and that will be our goal tomorrow, to thrive.

Q. Caroline and Carli, and Rhamat if you have something to add here, Caroline, last night you were talking about this is a team that's not afraid to win ugly, if you will. Get down, get gritty, play defense. Can you talk about how important that's been, and how important it will be facing a team like Nebraska? And if all of you can maybe weigh in on that?
CAROLINE KNOP: Yeah, it's going to be very important for us versus Nebraska. They are a very gritty team, and they keep the ball off the ground. So for us to find ways to score, it's going to be difficult. We're going to have to stay patient and long rallies and that's something we've been great at this year. Keep putting ourselves in position to win the rally as we like to say. We want to create chaos on their side and get a ball back that's easier so that we can score.

CARLI SNYDER: Yeah, I agree with what C.K. said. There have been moments this season where we just found a way to win. We have big matches from so many different people on our team. It's really cool to see that it could be anyone's night. When things do get a little ugly, we're not necessarily afraid of that. We always try to find a way to win and don't just kind of throw in the towel for that day. We can win when we're playing all different sorts of volleyball. So it's a really cool thing that this team can do.

Q. Rhamat, can you talk a little bit about the challenge from your position of stopping someone like Nebraska's Kelly Hunter who distributes all over the place, gets everybody involved, particularly for the middles, but for the whole team? How tough is that to contend with?
RHAMAT ALHASSAN: It's definitely a difficult thing to defend a team that has a very even offense because you don't know specifically where it's going to go in a perfect situation, that's the hardest situation to defend in. That goes back to us playing defense. Our defense starts with our serve, and it's going in and giving them a tough serve, that way we get them out of system. Once they're out of system, it does make blocking easier, and makes our lives easier. Like, cool, they can't hit the middle in this situation. I can go to the outside.

Q. Coach Wise said last night it's basically going to be an away game for you guys. Just kind of talk about, essentially, having to play in front of what's expected to be thousands of the opposing team's fans?
CAROLINE KNOP: I think we are so happy to embrace this moment. What an awesome environment this is. What a cool atmosphere it's going to be tomorrow night, and I love this. I love that we're going to be playing in front of 16,000 Nebraska fans and we're going to have our little section of orange and blue that's going to be cheering us on. That's all we need, to be completely honest.

I think this is a team that, again, will embrace the challenge. That's kind of been what we've done all year. We've shown that we can go on the road and win big games at Missouri was a great win, at Kentucky, 3-0. We can do this. And I think that we all believe that.

CARLI SNYDER: Well said. I think it's a championship match, and there is nothing about it that we want to be easy. It's so cool that we do get to play in front of a loud crowd, even if it is going against us, to have this match be such an exciting moment for volleyball, where there are so many people tuning in and so many people coming out to see great volleyball, I think that's something we really are embracing. It's going to be so much fun.

RHAMAT ALHASSAN: Just going off that, just playing in front of a crowd like this is something I don't think any single one of us has ever done, and I think we're all looking forward to it. There is no reason to look at it as a negative thing just because we're here, we made it here. That's what we wanted. We wanted to play in front of this many people, and I think we're really looking forward to it.

Q. All of you have talked about a special connection with your coach, Mary Wise. Can you talk about winning this and what it means for you because of that connection to her?
RHAMAT ALHASSAN: I kind of said that today this morning at the All-American breakfast, but just to be able to have a female coach on top. This is a sport where male coaches do dominate, especially with championship teams. To be able to do that in itself would be amazing. Just to create history at The University of Florida is another milestone that we really want to reach.

CARLI SNYDER: We all as players and the staff think the world of Mary as a person and a coach because she gets the best out of us and everyone she's around. So to be in this situation with this senior class and with her leading us is one of the most special things I could ever think of.

CAROLINE KNOP: Yeah, this is going to be unbelievable for Mary, but I think it's going to be unbelievable for all of us that came before us too. Florida is an iconic program, and there is so much to be said for all those All-Americans who have come before us and everyone that's come through the program. This just wouldn't be a win for Mary or our team would really be a win for Florida.

Q. Carli, I know last night after your match your coach said you might not be able to take too much away from the first match with Nebraska because they had a little bit of a different lineup in that match. But how do you feel you've improved the most over the course of the season since the last time you played Nebraska?
CARLI SNYDER: I think that was early preseason, and we were still figuring out who we were going to be this year. I think that match showed that we can pull out a tough five-set win, and we've kind of used that. That was our first five-setter of the year, and that showed a lot of toughness of our group. I think we have carried on so many things that we've learned from that match. We've gotten better over some years as Nebraska has itself. Our right side attack has evolved since then. We've been finding our middles in so many different situations, our connection on serve-receive and offense, the list goes on, because we have put in so much work to be at this moment, as any team in this moment has put in that work all season. So I just think it's going to be so much fun to see where we've evolved since the last time we played, and it's going to be a really great match.

Q. Can you tell me how you hurt your hand and what it feels like?
CAROLINE KNOP: Yeah, about a month ago I broke (my hand) in the first set against Arkansas at home. It feels ready to go, and it feels like I'm in the National Championship match.

Q. Can you take us through the evolution of your jump serve and how you got to be the only player on the team to hit the jump spin?
CARLI SNYDER: Yes, I did that serve in high school and when I got to college because of the load it takes to kill balls at this level and the strength that I needed to gain while I was here, we kind of put that on the back burner and developed different skills. But at the end of last year and this year, we kind of started working on it and getting mentally more confident with that serve and having the ability to actually go for it and make it a tough serve to pass. I think it's been a work in progress with my teammates and coaches being supportive over some ugly misses, and it's been working out well.

Q. Caroline, you had mentioned Missouri as being one of the tougher environments this year. Can you expand on that? What were some of the tough road environments that the Gators played in this year?
CAROLINE KNOP: Yeah, Kentucky was another one. Missouri was really difficult because they had a lot of fans against us. They were playing their best volleyball. That's what we're looking to get, definitely, out of this Nebraska team. They're going to bring their best. But being in that environment, we were down 19-12 in the second set, and we kind of had to turn it around. Going down 2-0 in that match would have been very difficult to come back from. So that was a difficult arena.

Kentucky poses problems. There are fans right on top of you, and then, obviously, it's going to be difficult and fun at the same time. Having 18,000 people in the stands is going to be pretty incredible. Like my teammates have said, something that we have never done before, but I think we can handle the pressure and we're excited to do that.

Q. Coach, do you sense maybe this could be a match that we could have a lot of rallies?
MARY WISE: It was interesting watching the first match last night. It was such a match of runs. Sometimes runs are so hard to come by, and I think a lot of it had to do with the first match with the crowd and all. As the match went on, you saw the longer rallies. Obviously, we experienced some elite level defensive plays. I think it bodes well for both teams.

We know about Nebraska as well coached as they are and because they're so disciplined, they don't give away points. So if it's a long rally, that means at least we're still in it. So I think that actually would be a good thing for the Gators.

Q. Can you talk a little bit about what the last 14 hours been like for you? Have you heard from people that you haven't heard from in a while? What has it been like since winning last night's game?
MARY WISE: It's been an amazing ride, but it started even before we arrived in Kansas City. As C.K. alluded to, advancing to this match and what a win would mean to not just this current group but all the alums that preceded them. The ones that put Florida volleyball on the map. Truly, one of the most impactful and empowering talks that were given to the players was right before we boarded the bus, Kelly Murphy, a four-time All-American, bronze medalist starter, came into the gym to say goodbye to the team and wish them well. Those who know Kelly, Kelly did not ever enjoy the spotlight. Would have hated to be up here talking -- she's more of an introvert and quiet. She was moved to tears telling the players that she never got that chance to play in the semifinals or the championship match. She wanted it so badly for this group. The look on the players at that moment, I think they realized, it's really not just about us. We are carrying the Gator Nation with us through this run as well.

Q. Coach, you've coached some teams that have made deep runs in the NCAA Tournament, but what sets this team apart?
MARY WISE: Sometimes it's just match-ups, and sometimes it's luck. Are you healthy? We felt we could have won it in 2003, but in October our middle blocker, who led and was one of the top-five in the country in blocking, tore her ACL. If Benavia Jenkins hadn't torn her ACL, what would that team have accomplished? Sometimes it's can you stay healthy? Can you be playing your best volleyball in the end? And what are the match-ups? There are some teams that we all face that they just pose bigger problems because of your strengths or your weaknesses.

In talking -- one of the beauties of being at Florida is that we have such a tight-knit group of coaches, and they are part of the reason the phones have blown up is all my fellow head coaches. You talk with them and they know the margin of error is so thin, whether that's in volleyball or soccer or basketball, track. Even our uber-successful women's tennis coach said, sometimes it takes a little luck just to get the stars to align for you. You just want to be relevant and give yourself a chance and then see how long you can last.

We've been lucky. We've been playing in December for a number of years.

Q. Would you say you're a different coach at all now than you were in 2003? If so, how?
MARY WISE: Besides being older?

Q. Philosophically, anyway that you might be able to draw on your experience of having been in this match before but also being in quite a few Final Fours, what do you bring in 2017 that maybe you didn't before?
MARY WISE: I think there is no substitute for the experience. Though none of these players have played in this type of match or in this type of environment, although some people would argue that Gregory Gym (in Austin, Texas), as close as they are, that's a fairly difficult place to play. Carli and Rhamat were on the court two years ago when we were just two points away from advancing to these championships.

But we did address the team with associate head coach Dave Boos, who was (in the national semifinals) while on staff with Minnesota, and our experiences, what this was like. It's about which team handles the pressure of all of the peripheral things that happen. Can you stay in your routine, stay the course when there are so many distractions?

One of the things we did last night was having the players turn in their phones. Now this one, Rhamat, gladly was the first one, happy to. Some of the freshmen it was a little harder for the younger players, but we are trying to limit the distractions. I think the balance of enjoying the experience, because it goes by so fast. For a lot of us, it's really hard to get here, but also to understand what got you here. That was the advice of our track coach who says before every championship he tells his team, 'remember who you brought to the dance,' and our team would say, 'no one brings us to the dance. We brought ourselves.' That was their response. We try to remember what it was we did well to get here and then try and repeat it.

Q. Coach, are you able to enjoy this a little more in the moment than back in 2003?
MARY WISE: I think so because there are expectations and you understand the spotlight and what that's going to be. Last night going into that match I just thought maybe because it was so late. Maybe because there was a fatigue factor. I felt our team was really focused there from the get-go. They had felt like that first match took a day to play. That's always how you feel when you're the second match. Then it's a five-set thriller.

But I think now having been through that, trying to enjoy the experience, but as we told our players, your family and friends will be there long after this weekend. This family, our volleyball family is going to be first just for another 24 hours.

Q. This is a follow-up to your response the other day. You said when your boys were young that it was important that Florida provided you with an important support system to help you get through the business as being a head coach. Can you cite an example of what Florida did for you specifically as a support model to help you get through that time?
MARY WISE: Yeah, sure. From the moment we arrived on campus, the optimal -- the story goes our oldest at the time, he was two, turning three, and three was the age you could enroll in Baby Gators, which is a phenomenal child development center on campus, but the waiting list was really, really long. And our athletics director, it was at a time when the athletic department was helping subsidize summer school for the university.

Remember, this is a long time ago, financially, and we had a conversation. For any parent, until your childcare works, you're not at work, because that's where your thoughts are, and he helped us create, and get a spot in there. And then both boys got to go through Baby Gators.

Traveling, the boys got to travel during those early years. My husband, when he was able to, he could travel with us and the boys were with me. So they're on the road, but he would take care of them and they provided that opportunity. Today it's not just coaching, there are other professions that are really hard.

An athletic trainer, how many women athletic trainers stay in that profession? The University of Florida allows for a female or male athletic trainer, they are the primary caregiver for that child, that those first two years they will support somebody going on the road with that child so that they can still continue working.

I think sometimes you have to think outside the box. If you want women to stay in a profession, then you've got to throw away the rules and help them through that time because if they can get through it, it works. But, man, those years are hard. They're really hard.

When I was going through it, there was no other female coach at this level who I could ask, 'how are you doing this? How does it work?' But the resources allow you when you're at work, you can be at work. Then when you're at home, you can be at home.

Q. Can you talk about Caroline Knop as a player?
MARY WISE: Our experience has been that when players transfer it often takes them maybe a year to really find their groove. C.K. found her groove the second she walked on campus. It helped she had the previous relationship with Carli and Rhamat having played in the USA program. But we asked her from the get-go, we needed her leadership, her competitiveness. Don't take a back seat. And her confidence level and competitiveness have driven all of us.

She's one of the highest volleyball IQ players I've ever coached as an undergrad, and I've ever coached, for that matter. She's going to make someone an awesome assistant.

Anybody who is watching this, hire her at once. They don't come with that much volleyball IQ the way she does.

Q. Even though she's All-SEC and an honorable mention All-American, she's really under the radar. You hear people talking about the great liberos and her name doesn't even come up.
MARY WISE: I think part of it is because she wasn't a great libero those first two years where she played outside hitter for Michigan. She was an undersized, gritty, tough-nosed left side who didn't think she was undersized. That's C.K., so perhaps if she had played four years in a position it would be different.

Q. What does Nebraska have to do to beat you?
MARY WISE: Nebraska would have to continue being low-error, can't give up points by Florida's middles, and they have to defend from pin-to-pin. Because we're going to try to get balls in the middle, and we're going to try to get kills from pin-to-pin.

Q. You guys showed a lot of grit. There were some tough spots in that match, and the win last night in set five. Were there other anecdotal answers this year of grit from your team? Might be on the court or might be just in general, the personality of this team that's shown a lot of ability to keep fighting?
MARY WISE: I look back to the second round match against Miami (Fla.), and those second-round matches, if we continue with the way seating is and the restrictions in terms of geography in those early-round matches, they're becoming in-state rival matches.

So, Miami and Florida, because of the schedule, we don't have an opportunity to play each other and yet it's Miami and Florida. We are 1-1, that was a huge match, especially because it was our in-state rival, Florida State, who a year ago after being down 0-2, came back and beat us in five (sets). Their senior class played light's-out. But that match was impetus starting in January, our very first meeting because we understood what happened in that match. We saw what a gritty team that refused to roll over did to us. Can we learn from that and not back down. That was why they worked so hard all spring. It was what they talked about. It wasn't like we had to bring it up, they knew it. It was also the first time we had the entire team here, with the exception of Shainah who was with Team Canada, every other player was here. Even our returning sophomores were here the entire summer on campus training. That usually doesn't happen, especially when you have a large rise in sophomore class. You may get them for half a summer, but not the entire summer.

Q. Do you think it's beneficial that you didn't steamroll through the tournament with a bunch of 3-0s?
MARY WISE: Oh, I think I would have loved it.

Q. But in terms of where you're at now, was it that good that you had those nail-biters?
MARY WISE: Yes, because I think the players have embraced that. We'll find a way. We're capable of finding a way, no matter what the scoreboard says. If we just keep fighting and doing what we do, and we call it play Gator volleyball. Hold the course, and we'll get our chance. We'll get our chance to make a run because we believe in each other's abilities to point score, whether that's Carli behind the service line, whether that's our front-row blocking, whatever it is. We've got a chance, and that's all you want. You just want a chance, and then we'll see what happens.

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