When talk turns to volleyball in the Southeastern Conference, the first school that comes to mind is Florida. After all, under coach Mary Wise, the Gators are working on a string of 18 straight Southeastern Conference championships.
But even Wise knows the times are a-changin’ in the conference. “This isn’t your mother’s SEC,” she said Friday night after Florida lost a five-set heartbreaker to Kentucky in the O’Connell Center.
Instead of being the chased, Florida (11-2, 5-1 SEC East) is now the chaser and the Gators, who rebounded with a three-set sweep of Tennessee Sunday, attempt to continue their pursuit of the Wildcats Wednesday night at 7 when they visit South Carolina (10-5, 2-4 SEC East). The match will be televised on ESPNU.
Falling to Kentucky proved what Wise had been seeing for years, that the rest of the SEC was improving with leaps and bounds and finally starting to get on par with the 18-time conference champion Gators.
Wise has seen her fair share of change in the game during her time at Florida’s helm, but she has adjusted to and thrived in each and every one of those changes in women’s volleyball.
When she started out at Florida, NCAA volleyball was played with side-out scoring, in which teams could only score points on their serve in sets played to 15. The style was one that Florida dominated for years, making five Final Fours in an 8-year span during that era.
“When we started here, it was side-out scoring,” Wise said. “You only scored off your serve. You could tell your team to go ahead and take chances when your team is serving because all you lose is the ability to serve. You lose the side out and they get a chance to serve. You would teach them when to swing and go for it.”
When the rules were changed to rally-scoring sets to 30 points after the 2000 season, the Gators seemed unfazed. Florida made the Final Four in 2002 and made its only national championship appearance in 2003, a season that saw the Gators lose only two matches, the first and last ones of the year to Southern California. The Gators did not drop a set in SEC play and only dropped two sets in the season to teams other than the Trojans.
“There were a lot of people that thought the sky was going to fall and it would be the end of women’s volleyball as we knew it if we went to rally score,” Wise said, “even though the rest of the world was going to rally score. You still have plenty of time for a comeback. I think the 30 points kept the separation.”
That separation was expected to become virtually nonexistent when the rules were changed once again as matches were shortened to 25 points. The Gators were expected to be a casualty to a combination of the rule changes and their youngest team yet. But once again, the Gators responded and pulled out another SEC title.
Wise has seen the rule changes combined with the increased talent level across the board close the gap more than ever.
“Does playing (to 25) give the underdog a better opportunity to beat a better team?” Wise said. “I think the answer is yes.”
That ability for underdogs to have a better chance against a perennial power such as Florida has been coupled with the fact that Wise is still seeing her team go through growing pains, ones that show up predominantly in lots of unforced errors at times.
In shorter games to 25, Wise is seeing just how crucial those errors have become for her team.
“If I use the analogy of a basketball team, we just made too many turnovers,” Wise said. “Turnovers that led to dunks because when we hit a ball out of bounds it’s an automatic point for the other team.”
Heading to South Carolina, Wise continued with basketball references, warning that the Gamecocks could give the Gators fits if the Florida team that showed up against Kentucky returns.
“They are like a full-court pressing team,” Wise said. “So for a team that makes unforced turnovers playing against a full-court pressing team, that’s a challenge.”
The good news is that the Gators have navigated a fairly strong schedule to solid success so far, with the young team only beginning to scratch the surface of its potential.
“There have been some years that I can say in October that this is about as good as we’re going to get, this is who we are,” Wise said. “That is just not the case, not with as many sophomores as we play and we’re still working in a new setter. I really like the potential of this team.”
With a tough conference loss under their belts, the Gators have a good chance to learn first-hand about themselves and tap further into that inner potential than if they kept on going without the driving pains of defeat.
“You definitely learn more from a loss than a win,” Wise said. “If we win that would we learn as much as we did? It wouldn’t have changed. We still hit balls out of bounds. When we talk about maturity, we’re talking about volleyball maturity—game experience, which of the balls you can take full swings at, which do you have to take something off. A lot of coaching is after you’ve taught them how to do something, the next step is when to do it.”
To speed up that learning process, Wise has tried different tactics, such as putting players on sand for two-on-two beach volleyball in the off-season, along with the usual videotape sessions and walk-throughs. But she knows nothing beats experience.
“There really isn’t a fast-forward button that you can push,” Wise said.
The Gators are still trying to master the intricacies of the game, but it is clear they have taken a big step forward after their first conference loss.
“We just kind of talked about as a team what things we can change and things we can change individually to make our team better as a whole,” said sophomore Kristy Jaeckel. “We’re really going to work on holding each other accountable for those things and going from there.”
That accountability started on Saturday, when the Gators watched tape of their loss to Kentucky. They noticed the obvious things, like the unforced errors for instance. But the biggest thing they noticed was the team’s mentality.
“The attitude has to be different now,” said junior Lauren Bledsoe. “We have to take advantage of every single point and understand that every team is capable of coming back. We might get this mindset of getting unfocused at some point and not finishing a match. The attitude needs to change where we’re still focused and get to 25 as soon as possible.”
Wise hasn’t been quiet about calling out that mentality, specifically her team’s “volleyball IQ,” which she directly attributed to immaturity. It was definitely a wake-up call for a team with talent that knows it still has plenty of room to raise its level of play.
“It’s something that we can either dwell on and pout,” Jaeckel said, “or we can take it for what it is, take it with a grain of salt, and use it to get better. I think that we definitely need to take it for what it is. We need to take offense to that. We have something to prove.”
The Gators proved something to themselves and the rest of the conference by bouncing back and not letting the Vols steal a set on their home court.
Now Florida hits the road and gets a chance to prove if that attitude change will carry over through the rest of the season.
One thing’s for sure: If the Gators’ intensity and focus can consistently match their talent, they will truly be a force to be reckoned with.
As they say, history tends to repeat itself. So it wouldn’t be smart to bet against Mary Wise’s Florida Gators.
SOUTHEASTERN CONFERENCE
EASTERN DIVISION
SEC Pct. Div. ALL Pct.
Kentucky 5-0 1.00 2-0 15-1 .938
Florida 5-1 .833 1-1 11-2 .846
Tennessee 3-2 .600 1-1 10-5 .667
Georgia 2-3 .400 0-0 11-5 .688
South Carolina 2-4 .333 0-2 10-5 .667
WESTERN DIVISION
SEC Pct. Div. ALL Pct.
Louisiana State 5-1 .833 3-0 11-4 .733
Alabama 4-2 .667 2-1 6-10 .375
Auburn 3-2 .600 3-2 11-5 .688
Arkansas 2-4 .333 0-1 8-9 .471
Mississippi 0-6 .000 0-1 6-10 .375
Mississippi State 0-6 .000 0-3 4-13 .235
SCHEDULE
WEDNESDAY, OCT. 7
Florida at South Carolina, 7 p.m.
FRIDAY, OCT. 9
Auburn at Kentucky, 7 p.m.
Georgia at Tennessee, 7 p.m.
Alabama at Arkansas, 8 p.m.
Mississippi State at Mississippi, 8 p.m.
South Carolina at Louisiana State, 8 p.m.
SUNDAY, OCT. 11
Auburn at Tennessee, 1:30 p.m.
Georgia at Kentucky, 1:30 p.m.
Alabama at Mississippi, 2:30 p.m.
Mississippi State at Arkansas, 2:30 p.m.
Florida at Louisiana State, 7 p.m. (ESPNU)
WEDNESDAY, OCT. 14
Mississippi at Arkansas, 8 p.m.
FRIDAY, OCT. 16
Florida at Auburn, 7 p.m.
South Carolina at Georgia, 7 p.m.
Tennessee at Alabama, 7 p.m.
Kentucky at Mississippi State, 8 p.m.
Arkansas at Louisiana State, 8 p.m.
SUNDAY, OCT. 18
Florida at Georgia, 1:30 p.m.
Kentucky at Alabama, 2:30 p.m.
Mississippi at Louisiana State, 2:30 p.m.
Tennessee at Mississippi State, 2:30 p.m.
South Carolina at Auburn, 3:30 p.m.
BISON/AVCA DIVISION I POLL
As of Oct. 5
Rank/School W-L Pts Prv
1. Penn State (48) 16-0 1485 1
2. Texas (9) 11-0 1441 2
3. Washington (3) 14-0 1394 3
4. Hawai’i 13-2 1320 4
5. Minnesota 13-3 1207 8
6. Florida 11-2 1090 5
7. Stanford 9-4 1073 11
8. Michigan 15-2 1046 6
9. Nebraska 10-4 952 10
10. Kentucky 15-1 883 15
11. Oregon 11-2 872 7
12. Illinois 10-3 816 12
13. Southern California 13-3 774 13
14. Iowa State 12-3 739 14
15. California 8-5 726 9
16. UCLA 12-5 688 16
17. Baylor 16-1 583 19
18. Michigan State 14-2 372 23
19. Florida State 12-2 350 17
20. Long Beach State 10-3 330 22
21. Saint Louis 10-5 271 21
22. Arizona 12-3 216 18
23. UC Irvine 13-3 185 24
24. San Diego 9-4 122 20
25. Washington State 14-1 113 NR
Others receiving votes: Texas A&M 88, Louisiana State 42, Oregon State 42, St. Mary’s (Calif.) 38, Colorado State 33, Notre Dame 32, Dayton 26, Duke 25, UC Santa Barbara 25, Wichita State 22, Pepperdine 18, Northern Iowa 16, Missouri State 13, Indiana 9, Purdue 9, Cal State Fullerton 6.