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The University of Mississippi Athletics
Steven McRoberts Weekly Press Conference #7
10/7/2019 | Volleyball
Ole Miss Volleyball Head Coach Steven McRoberts met with members of the media on Monday as part of his weekly press conference. Coach McRoberts discussed the Rebels 11-match win streak, their undefeated record in conference play, and what's next for Ole Miss...
Opening Statement:
"It was a great weekend being able to go on the road and win at Mississippi State and LSU. [That was] big time for our team. Friday night was just a weird match. We came out and won the first set 25-9 and were kind of rolling. I thought we made some unforced errors in that second set that took some momentum away from us and the next thing you know, we're in a dogfight. We lost a close set there. Mississippi State handled us pretty good in the third and I think they were up 15-10 at the media break in the fourth set. It kind of started to feel like we let one get away from us. I can't ever remember in 23 years of coaching, beating a team like we did in that first set, 25-9 and then being in jeopardy of losing the match. Mississippi State is a much-improved team from the year before. It's a tough environment, they had the place packed and just a rivalry game. You always know you're going to get the best from your rival. We hung in there, made a run late in that fourth set and ended up winning the fifth."
On Sunday's match at LSU:
"I think it just energized us for the Sunday match. Nayo Warnelland Leah Mulkeyboth had great weekends and hit for high percentages. They're seniors, as well as Emily Stroup,had a great match at Mississippi State. After the match we were flying to Baton Rouge and had plane troubles, of course. We didn't get into Baton Rouge until about 2:30 a.m. on Saturday morning. Luckily, we didn't play until Sunday and 18 to 21-year olds bounce back a whole that faster than a 50-year old. We had a good practice that Saturday and had a good match on Sunday against LSU. That's also another tough place to play, another rivalry game. I felt like we played well enough to win there in three sets, but we won in four. We're not ever going to complain about wins. We're 3-0 in the SEC for the first time in my six seasons here. We are a half-game behind Kentucky for first and [the two of us] are the only two undefeated teams in conference play right now. Anna Bairhad a good bounce-back match for us on Sunday at LSU because she did not play great on Friday night. It was the first time I can remember all season her not having a solid match. I was proud to see her bounce back. We had four players in double digit kills and Nayo [Warnell] was one kill away from having her 10th kill as well. Really balanced attack at LSU. I thought our defense did great there too."
On Wednesday's upcoming match at Missouri:
"Now we turn around and are going to be on a plane again on Tuesday to head to Missouri. They're Top 25. Another great program, well coached. I don't know if we've won there since I've been here so it's going to be tough. It'll be another nationally televised match on the SEC Network. It's going to be a challenge, so hopefully we can keep this consistency. That's something that we've preached since day one is consistency and belief that we can win. Right now it's just a great feeling where we're at, but there's a long way to go and our team knows that. We have to keep winning to have an opportunity to be playing in the postseason."
On whether the 11-3, 3-0 SEC record changes the team's goals:
"Our goal has always been to play after the regular season in the NCAA Tournament. It puts us in a better position to reach those goals for sure… I think we're going to have to get at least double digit wins in the SEC. We're at best 30 percent to our goal of that. We just have a really resilient group. We've got four seniors in the rotation. I think on Friday and Sunday that was the difference is we played a couple teams with a lot of youth who made some mistakes under pressure at times. Our seniors really stepped up when they needed to"
On where Emily Stroup ranks amongst the players Coach McRoberts has coached:
"Well it's different levels going from NAIA, Division II, Mid-Major to now being Power Five. She's at the top probably and has to be in that top group for sure. There's a small number of players that can do what she does. Even yesterday when we beat LSU in four at LSU, she was probably our fourth best attacker on the day. That tells you where our program has grown from last year to this year. If she has that match last year we're walking out of there losing 0-3. What a lot of people don't see is teams serve to her almost every time to try to get her out of the offense. She's digging double digits every single match. She's just a work horse coming into the gym once, twice a week for extra reps. That's the type of player she is. She sets the tone with the kind of example for our younger players that she is 82 kills from the all-time program record. She's the one in the gym wanting extra reps, so that's why she's as great as she is. I can't think of anyone that would be better."
On how the team turned it around at Mississippi State:
"It's funny because there was a frustration during the third and fourth sets that we couldn't figure out why all of a sudden the wheels just came off. To Mississippi State's credit, they really like to set the middles and right side, and if they're passing well they are hard to stop. You can look at their percentages that those players hit and we weren't serving tough and they started getting more and more confident. In the fourth set, I didn't call an early timeout when I knew we had a media timeout at 15 and I was just letting it play out. These other timeouts I've taken early haven't worked so let's just play and we still are down 15-10 and I'm thinking maybe I should have taken one earlier but I didn't. We needed those two timeouts late in the set. We started serving tougher and got them out of system. Our defense picked up and again our seniors got us some big kills in some big moments. They made some kills early in the fifth that helped us. Sometimes the momentum in volleyball sometimes is just crazy how it works. You can see that where teams win big and turn around and lose big in the next set. If anybody can ever figure that out, they'd make a lot of money about why that happens."
Opening Statement:
"It was a great weekend being able to go on the road and win at Mississippi State and LSU. [That was] big time for our team. Friday night was just a weird match. We came out and won the first set 25-9 and were kind of rolling. I thought we made some unforced errors in that second set that took some momentum away from us and the next thing you know, we're in a dogfight. We lost a close set there. Mississippi State handled us pretty good in the third and I think they were up 15-10 at the media break in the fourth set. It kind of started to feel like we let one get away from us. I can't ever remember in 23 years of coaching, beating a team like we did in that first set, 25-9 and then being in jeopardy of losing the match. Mississippi State is a much-improved team from the year before. It's a tough environment, they had the place packed and just a rivalry game. You always know you're going to get the best from your rival. We hung in there, made a run late in that fourth set and ended up winning the fifth."
On Sunday's match at LSU:
"I think it just energized us for the Sunday match. Nayo Warnelland Leah Mulkeyboth had great weekends and hit for high percentages. They're seniors, as well as Emily Stroup,had a great match at Mississippi State. After the match we were flying to Baton Rouge and had plane troubles, of course. We didn't get into Baton Rouge until about 2:30 a.m. on Saturday morning. Luckily, we didn't play until Sunday and 18 to 21-year olds bounce back a whole that faster than a 50-year old. We had a good practice that Saturday and had a good match on Sunday against LSU. That's also another tough place to play, another rivalry game. I felt like we played well enough to win there in three sets, but we won in four. We're not ever going to complain about wins. We're 3-0 in the SEC for the first time in my six seasons here. We are a half-game behind Kentucky for first and [the two of us] are the only two undefeated teams in conference play right now. Anna Bairhad a good bounce-back match for us on Sunday at LSU because she did not play great on Friday night. It was the first time I can remember all season her not having a solid match. I was proud to see her bounce back. We had four players in double digit kills and Nayo [Warnell] was one kill away from having her 10th kill as well. Really balanced attack at LSU. I thought our defense did great there too."
On Wednesday's upcoming match at Missouri:
"Now we turn around and are going to be on a plane again on Tuesday to head to Missouri. They're Top 25. Another great program, well coached. I don't know if we've won there since I've been here so it's going to be tough. It'll be another nationally televised match on the SEC Network. It's going to be a challenge, so hopefully we can keep this consistency. That's something that we've preached since day one is consistency and belief that we can win. Right now it's just a great feeling where we're at, but there's a long way to go and our team knows that. We have to keep winning to have an opportunity to be playing in the postseason."
On whether the 11-3, 3-0 SEC record changes the team's goals:
"Our goal has always been to play after the regular season in the NCAA Tournament. It puts us in a better position to reach those goals for sure… I think we're going to have to get at least double digit wins in the SEC. We're at best 30 percent to our goal of that. We just have a really resilient group. We've got four seniors in the rotation. I think on Friday and Sunday that was the difference is we played a couple teams with a lot of youth who made some mistakes under pressure at times. Our seniors really stepped up when they needed to"
On where Emily Stroup ranks amongst the players Coach McRoberts has coached:
"Well it's different levels going from NAIA, Division II, Mid-Major to now being Power Five. She's at the top probably and has to be in that top group for sure. There's a small number of players that can do what she does. Even yesterday when we beat LSU in four at LSU, she was probably our fourth best attacker on the day. That tells you where our program has grown from last year to this year. If she has that match last year we're walking out of there losing 0-3. What a lot of people don't see is teams serve to her almost every time to try to get her out of the offense. She's digging double digits every single match. She's just a work horse coming into the gym once, twice a week for extra reps. That's the type of player she is. She sets the tone with the kind of example for our younger players that she is 82 kills from the all-time program record. She's the one in the gym wanting extra reps, so that's why she's as great as she is. I can't think of anyone that would be better."
On how the team turned it around at Mississippi State:
"It's funny because there was a frustration during the third and fourth sets that we couldn't figure out why all of a sudden the wheels just came off. To Mississippi State's credit, they really like to set the middles and right side, and if they're passing well they are hard to stop. You can look at their percentages that those players hit and we weren't serving tough and they started getting more and more confident. In the fourth set, I didn't call an early timeout when I knew we had a media timeout at 15 and I was just letting it play out. These other timeouts I've taken early haven't worked so let's just play and we still are down 15-10 and I'm thinking maybe I should have taken one earlier but I didn't. We needed those two timeouts late in the set. We started serving tougher and got them out of system. Our defense picked up and again our seniors got us some big kills in some big moments. They made some kills early in the fifth that helped us. Sometimes the momentum in volleyball sometimes is just crazy how it works. You can see that where teams win big and turn around and lose big in the next set. If anybody can ever figure that out, they'd make a lot of money about why that happens."
Players Mentioned
OH
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