Quote the Horns: Oct. 9
Oct. 9, 2009
The second-ranked Texas volleyball team hosts Oklahoma on Saturday, Oct. 10. First serve is set for Noon Central. Head Coach Jerritt Elliott On Ashley Engle’s attitude: She’s grown up a lot in the last four years. I think I told her parent s a couple weeks ago that over the summer she even took another step, maturity-wise. She doesn’t act like a college student. She’s very focused and she is able to hold people accountable and say what’s on her mind. Thos are all the qualities you want to have in your captain, as someone who is going to lead you on the court. On Destinee Hooker’s improvement: She’s gotten a lot better. Destinee continues to improve and has a lot more confidence. We’ve been able to use her as a service player and a lot more in the back court. She continues to be a bright spot. And that’s maturity. The difference between this team and years past at this point is that they are able to show up and be more consistent in practice. I think I stopped practice about 12 times last year to have meetings with them in the team room, and today we’ve only had one. Their daily standards are high, they are goal driven, they know what it takes and we continue to remind them on a daily basis.
On the season: Well, it’s gotten better. This has been a good rest for us, since we gave them three days off. It’s been extremely taxing for them. It’s been a challenge. And we need to get better in all facets of our game, but we can continue to get better from the service line, which is the big area that we need to focus on. The blocking game needs to continue to make strides, and our defensive touches, whether it is the first-ball touch on the serve/receive or the first dig. If we can learn to control that then our game will get better. Junior outside hitter Juliann Faucette On whether there is anything particular to learn about Oklahoma: We just go over the types of things that they do and the types of things they bring to the court. Not anything too specific on our side. On what it takes to step up to the plate every night: Well, just coming this far and seeing all the great teams. We know Oklahoma is going to come ready to play and that’s something we just have to work on. We just have to be focused and stay ready and take advantage of our home court. On reminders that inspire Texas to play at a high level every match: Well, I think that one reminder is last year when Oklahoma came here and they beat us in five games. A loss is always going to be a wake-up call for us and that is definitely in our minds going into this match. Senior outside hitter Destinee Hooker On her passing: I don’t really worry about the digs, I just worry about getting the ball to my setter. Whenever the ball comes to me, I want to do my best to get it there so she doesn’t have to struggle. I mean, I was a setter in seventh grade and I know exactly how it feels to run all over the place. All I wanted to do was give our outside hitter an opportunity to hit the ball. On playing with more intensity in her final season: Definitely. Before every game, me, Ashley [Engle], and Heather [Kisner] link fingers and we’re just like ‘Hey let’s go out senior year, win or lose, we’re committed.’ Knowing that it is our last year, we want to go out with a bang. We don’t want to go out knowing that we could’ve done better. Sophomore middle blocker Rachael Adams On the team’s closeness: Since we’ve been together since Europe that has brought us close together. Then we all stayed the whole summer and that made us even tighter. And I think this is the tightest group I have ever played with.
|
|
