Volleyball Cats Hope to Keep Momentum Going in Postseason

The Kentucky volleyball team will host the first and second rounds of the 2017 NCAA Volleyball Tournament on Friday and Saturday at Memorial Coliseum. And while that’s obviously a big deal for the current Wildcats, UK head coach Craig Skinner also knows that having this event in Lexington is big for his growing sport.

“I’d say the excitement and the enthusiasm of the volleyball community in Lexington is off the charts right now with the growth of the sport in the state and this city,” Skinner said. “Our success, the success of club volleyball, the success of high school volleyball around the area has been huge. For us to be able to host an event like this continues our deal of always wanting to grow the game of volleyball. I think we’re seeing it before our eyes. I think we’re seeing a movement of attendance in college volleyball around the country and it’s pretty special to be a part of.”

And it’s not just in Lexington, but statewide that volleyball is booming. Both Louisville and Western Kentucky also won conference titles this season, something that Skinner appreciates.

“That’s pretty cool, for all three of us to be able to win a conference championship from the same state,” Skinner said. “I don’t know how many other states who have three universities like that who have done it. That’s an awesome accomplishment for a state this size to be able to do that in the conferences like we play in. I think it says a heck of a lot about the grass roots of the sport in the state, I think it says a lot about the commitment of the universities to make the sport important, I think it says a lot about the coaching staffs at each university.”

For their part, the 2017 Wildcats face East Tennessee State in Friday’s second match (7:30 p.m. ET), following Western Kentucky against Notre Dame in the opener. Skinner hopes that the tough environments that the Wildcats have seen this season will have the team prepared for the rigors of postseason play.

“It’s important, you want to be in tough situations, you want to be down and learn how to fight back, you want to be in front of big crowds, to know what that feels like,” Skinner said. “You want to have media coverage to know that there’s distractions and things going on to try to narrow your focus. I won’t put anything past this team, they showed toughness in situations like that and I think that’s the sign of a mature team.”

The SEC regular season co-champion Wildcats are the top seed in their NCAA Tournament bracket, something that Skinner and the team were aiming for at the beginning of the 2017 campaign.

“We knew we had a lot of physical talent returning, we had a great recruiting class coming in,” Skinner said. “Our team talked in January about competing for an SEC championship and going beyond what we have (done) in the NCAA Tournament. We didn’t shy away from setting the expectation high for ourselves.”

“It hasn’t been easy and we’ve had to overcome some challenges that some people see and some people don’t see,” said Skinner. “The physical talent was there, the character was there, the leadership was there, we just had to get the right blueprint in order to chip away at it each day and each week.”

Skinner and the Wildcats hope that the same blueprint can carry them through the first weekend of the NCAA Tournament in Lexington on Friday and Saturday.