Kentucky Volleyball 2024 Season Preview | Point Kentucky

[Music] what's up guys welcome back to point Kentucky my name is Hunter Mitchell that is Leah Edmond Leah how are you I'm doing good how are you I'm good welcome to season two of Point Kentucky everybody we had a great uh Premiere last year so we are both very excited to be back I cannot believe it is already time for volleyball season again it feels like we just end the season two months ago oh literally I'm like oh my goodness it's already time for another season but I mean it's the best time of the year so why wouldn't you want to rush to this time anyway it is and Craig Skinner as we know likes to get the season started with a bang every year so we're going to start the year with about as big as you can get because on Tuesday Kentucky will travel right up the road to Louisville Kentucky and they will take on Nebraska the one of the few teams that Craig Skinner has failed to beat his entire time at Kentucky his credit he keeps saying he's going to keep scheduling them one day it's just going to happen that he beats them he's still doing it he's a man of his word he's still doing it before we get to that game let's look at the roster obviously last time we talked uh together and talked to you guys um kuy's roster looked a lot different compared to where it is now Reagan Rutherford um she she was finished she had an extra year of Eligibility if she wanted it she did decide to use it but elected to go to Texas play for the Longhorns team up with former Wildcat mty Skinner um and she will be playing back home closer to family I I had a good relationship with her family and and they had no bad blood they loved their time in Lexington could not say enough great things about the staff and about the team she just wanted to play closer to home because she hadn't gotten to do that in four years so you cannot blame her for that but K Kentucky loses their Lefty on the right side which is a very big asset they've had the last four years and then obviously the other two big ones um Johnny theler and Elise getsinger both graduating from Kentucky elely also decided to use that fifth year but she is playing for kraton who was ranked 12 in the top 25 pole probably not a coincidence considering they got a great middle blocker pickup and then Kentucky loses Jordan Thompson to transfer she's playing in Kansas State um those are kind of the the big ones we we Thompson didn't play last year but we were expecting her to have a pretty solid role this year in going forward but she liked to go to Kansas State so all that to say the roster looks very different Kentucky lost three starters Leah what are you seeing out of this roster I'm assuming you've at least gotten to see them a little bit this summer I'm not sure how much you have what are you seeing out of this roster so far um well I think it was helpful that this year they got to take their foreign trip so every four years each NCA program can elect to take their um team on a trip to a foreign country and so Kentucky this past May went to Japan and they were there for about 10 days and so the great thing about that is you get training days so instead of being done at about late April and not touching a volleyball again with a coach until August you get to train for a couple more days in May so they were able to get their new freshman in and some of their transfers allow them to start understanding Kentucky volleyball and then they got to go and play other teams for 10 days straight and they got to get more practice in more coaching so they have an opportunity to not I mean every team it kind of switches I mean we went the last foreign trip they went on was my senior year because of covid and so it's really beneficial you get to get people in a gym before you start summer workouts and you get to start kind of hammering in how you want to play Kentucky volleyball you can see how people are doing because you're not playing your usual opponents you're playing with a different ball and you're playing against very different styles of volleyball so I think it was super beneficial for them um in terms of this roster it's it's a beautiful looking roster okay it found a way to fill in some holes not only with the Freshman coming in but even moving people on the rostar already so Megan Wilson has now moved back to the right side which was her position that she played at Oklahoma before she transferred here to Kentucky and so putting her back on the right side now you have a 64 right side which is huge especially with some of the outsides that ky's going to go against this season to ha her over there and now that kind of opens up that outside position you have multiple people who are fighting for that position but I would not be shocked to see the Freshman outside Asia in that position she has a hammer of an arm I got to see a little bit of it while they were working camps and even as they were playing in Japan if she has a weapon of an arm she is's very Fearless my type of volleyball player so you have that nice fight between her Brooklyn delay and Aaron lamb you have a bunch of veterans and you might have a freshman in there and then that middle position is going to be very very interesting to see who fits in with that you have a two red shirt freshmen that are able to get in there not really a big veteran in that spot you have some a little bit of youngans I guess in that area so it's going to be interesting with that I mean Setter and bro I think you're not going to see that much of a change I would be interesting to see between Molly tozo and Elanor bevon if one of them happens to get it if Molly steals that away from Elanor and her senior year it's going to be super interesting but they have enough depth that they might be able to um show a little bit something that different and of course I mean with Craig non-conference is the time to do it and he takes pride and okay maybe we might suck during this time but once that mid-september conference time hits you have no problem figuring out and what knowing what you need to do then yeah you you mentioned Asia thigpin he talked on media day about um what Asia might be this year for Kentucky she actually is an interesting player when she came into Kentucky she was actually listed as a def defensive specialist labero and announed hitter we don't see that super often so he even talked in media day you are going to see Asia we're just not sure if it's going to be in a back row capacity or if she's going to be in a front row capacity or if it's going to be a both so her being um battling against Aaron lamb and Brooklyn delay in practice to figure out who gets that second starting spot's going to be really interesting because she is um everything I've heard about Asia is just that she is a freak athlete and that she has a lot of natural um ability to to play the game obviously we're I think a lot of people are excited to see what Brook Bola can do this year got that injury last year but there was a lot of hype around what she could be last year before she got hurt even in the few warm-ups that I've gotten to watch Brooke she looks really good she loves the slide so we know Elise love that slide it looks like you might be getting some kind of a replacement with Brook brooken regard we'll see how well she can do this is the first time she'll be playing real Collegiate minutes this season um but everything I've heard about Brooke in practice has been Brooke looks really good so I think they're really encouraged by what they're seeing out of her even though she is relatively new because she didn't play last year she got a full year to be in be in the system to see how the coaching staff Works um to travel with the team all that stuff so I think we're going to see a lot of great things out of Brooke I'm excited to get to watch her play and then like you mentioned the the other middle blocker is it going to be Delany Hogan the senior transfer um is it going to be Kennedy Washington The Freshman again Craig talked about they've got depth even Jordan Dy who they've moved in the middle there's some depth in that middle position that they're excited about seeing you know who wins the competition and who gets to St stay there again you mentioned Megan Wilson officially moving to the right pin where she's naturally more comfortable last year we saw a lot of shuffling of her and Aaron lamb in and out of the lineup and I think some of their early offensive struggles were because they weren't ever in a rhythm because it was a new lineup every time so it's cool to see her transition to her natural position on the right side with Reagan Rutherford gone you need a way to make up from that offense hopefully with Megan officially knowing hey I'm starting on that right side she'll get to get into a little bit of a rhythm from the very beginning um because like you mentioned it's such a benefit to have her on the right pin being 6'4 you want to put as much size against opposing out of hitters when you're playing you know the Matty skinners or the Harper Maurice of Nebraska like all of these really big physical outsides to have a right side that's 6'4 is a huge asset so let really cool to get to see Megan hopefully come into that role um and be a little bit more natural with that position obviously a lot of people have asked this on Twitter there's no uh we just scroll through the roster we obviously don't see Audrey Whitworth on the roster she decided to step away from the program again didn't hear a single bad thing about it I think she just decided she was ready to stop playing volleyball right now and there's nothing wrong with that that's a big loss though you're you're losing a a defensive specialist that had great instincts that was a really good Digger for Kentucky she there were a lot of games where she was an unsung hero you quiet looked down and she had 18 digs and you said where'd that come from there's going to be you're going to have to figure out how to replace that um and then obviously looking forward to seeing the development of what does Molly tuzo be in a sophomore year what does Brooklyn delay become in a sophomore year we'll get to them in a little bit but this is a roster that's kind of a hybrid you've got a lot of seniors in big positions in immigr and elor Bon and the C in libero but you've got a lot of Youth in a lot of your offensive positions so it's going to be interesting to see how does Kentucky play last year they struggled really early with killing the ball so hopefully this this year they can get off to a little bit of a better start um I think it's going to help to see Brooklyn now that she's had a year under her belt you don't have to see that growing pain that we saw from her um one thing we need to note Craig announced on Monday that Hannah Benjamin The Freshman outside a lot of really I mean I really excited to see her play she unfortunately hurt her knee right before that Japan trip so she is out for the season that stinks because I think a lot of people were excited to see her also be added into that outside hitter battle she looked really really really our game that that she played in all American game excuse me um she looked great she hit out of the back row really well she's a good front row player I was excited to see her so unfortunately we have to wait another year to see her um but outside of that it seems like the staff is really high on what Kentucky can be and we saw the ABCA release their poll this week it looks like the country is excited about what Kentucky can be ranked number nine I wasn't expecting them to be ranked that high given what they lost last year in Rutherford and terer and getsinger those are some seniors those were national champions you lost all three of them three of your six starters were you surprised to see Kentucky all the way up to nine the preseason a little bit um I was expecting more of a 10 to 15 range because I think that's now Kentucky has solidified themselves that they're usually a top 15 team and they're going to stay in the top 15 so they see them at nine I was like okay then but I'm not necessarily shocked as in like oh my God you put them too high I think with the roster that they do have I think that's the fun thing about it being a coaches poll is those coaches recruited those same players and know what they're capable of as well and they also know what Craig is capable of of a coach and so I think that number encompasses not only the players but who those coaching staff is because regardless of what group of players Craig has he's gonna find a way to win he's going to make sure that they're successful as many times as possible throughout the season so I think that's also kind of a not a I guess not a shout out but a praise to the coaching staff and what they're able to do of knowing that like hey no matter what this might look like they might have three or four freshmen or people have never played at a college level on the court but that doesn't mean anything they're going to still play Kentucky volleyball so not shocking to see them that high up I'm intrigued to see how quickly that changes especially because there were some teams that I was like oh I'm intrigued to see how they get through non-conference especially because some of them have some brutal schedules Kentucky included let's get to that schedule Kentucky has 11 matches this year against teams that are currently ranked in that top 25 not even counting Western Kentucky which is the 26th ranked team so technically if you want to throw them in there as a Asis they're almost there Kentucky has one of the hardest schedules I've seen Craig put together and the funny thing is I feel like we say that every year now with Craig but he has built another Gauntlet beginning next week with Nebraska this is a schedule that's got the likes of Nebraska Texas Stanford Pinn State Louisville obviously Florida you've got Georgia who's ranking the top 25 twice you've got Tennessee Leah this is a gauntlet it it is and it's kind of not their fault because of Texas and Oklahoma joining the but I mean that non-conference schedule isn't shocking at all and it's definitely going to be a lot different than what we've seen the past two years especially because last year they weren't able to host as many games home because of uh the construction of Memorial so I think it might be a little bit different than last year because they're getting probably double the chances to play at home that they didn't last year I'm pretty sure I think on what they played maybe two or three games at home and I believe it was like that pit game and maybe one more game that they actually got to play at home during that non-conference so I think it's going to be more normal in terms of how the seon The non-conference Works getting into rhythm of you get to be at home and you get to be away it's not you're traveling for three out of those four days and you're playing somewhere that you're not used to you have no fans so I'm expecting maybe a little bit of a difference especially with Memorial opening up in the fall I think it's going to be a lot of excitement around it a lot of fun of getting to play at home because some of these girls is their first time getting to play in Memorial Coliseum and being at home in that type of sense and so I think they have the potential to maybe have a different non-conference than they' had last year just because they just getting OPP equal opportunities to play at home and play away but I mean it it's a hard schedule and also beauty of this is because they're playing such a hard schedule and Kentucky has solidified themselves as one of the the top teams in the nation they get to play a lot on National Television starting with next Tuesday they're playing on ESPN and big ESPN not like ESPN or ESPNU and so that's super exciting that not only does the volleyball world see Kentucky as a Powerhouse but networks see them as a Powerhouse of that game has to be on television I think that's super super exciting that they're getting to play on such big big um networks and television times so people can see them play and I think it's great for the sport and great for Kentucky well especially you mentioned Memorial being brand new and opening this fall you look at all these games you get Pinn state who's currently ranked seventh at home you get Louisville who's ranked sixth at home you get Nebraska not at home but they're in Louisville so they're still in the in your neck of the woods you're going to get Texas at home in the SEC like this is a schedule that it's really difficult but you're going to get to see some really great matches and a brand new beautiful Memorial Coliseum the plans the photos that they've been releasing the videos this new building looks like it is going to be an incredible venue I am so excited just to be in there and cover games in general but especially when the likes of Penn State and Louisville come to town those are going to be games that are going to be so much fun the fact that you got this SE this the schedule yeah it's really hard but this is the perfect year to do it because the interest is going to be through the roof with Memorial being so brand new and so pretty let's shift to Nebraska we our first game of the M our first game of the season it's time to go our first preview um it's about as big of a preview as you can get Nebraska obviously went all the way to the national championship game last year before falling to Texas in straight sets that was a straight set sweep but Nebraska is really really really young they had a lot of crazy talented freshmen those freshmen now have played a full year under their belt they're coming into Louisville next week having gotten you know a whole offseason under the belt like this is going to be a true heavyweight fight Harper Murray on the left pin as announced hitter is incredibly talented they have so many great pieces Lexi Rodriguez is one of the best liberos if not the best libero in the country like what have you seen out out of Nebraska Leah what's Kentucky need to expect what do Kentucky fans need to expect out of this team next week well I mean it's the experience like you said they went to the National semifinals last year they're led by two seniors Merritt B and Lexi Rodriguez was their unanimous Captain decision they announced this week and so they have so many weapons but they also have that seniority and it's Nebraska they've played on the highest level in front of the biggest stages and so coming into a Louisville crowd that might be more Kentucky favored or just Kentucky fans in general um there that's not going to bother them they are going to come in and do their job they're really really well known for their ball control I mean getting balls in the Setter's hands as much as possible and with Lexi Rodriguez they do a number of staying in system but she can become so frustrating for hitters and I think that's going to be the thing that we're looking out for if we do have a young starting lineup especially in the hit out you cannot get frustrated because she's digging your balls you just have to give her her credit of she is the best libero in the country right now and it it sucks when she gets the balls up that you think that are down but staying the course and realizing not every ball is going to be dug but not letting that get into your head and not playing a void ball which is always my fear when you have a really good labero I.E Morgan hints I've played against her when you have that type of labero you sometimes start to think about where to hit more and you start trying to avoid the block avoid where she is and start making more mistakes than you need to so the big thing is going to be playing Kentucky volleyball not allowing what they're doing on the side of the net to affect what Kentucky is doing and it's going to start from the service line they're going to have to be so so aggressive from the service line which is not usually a problem but in that stage on the first game nerves are going to show and nerves are going to show for the first 10 points for both sides it doesn't matter how highly ranked you are how many times you've been in that situation the first game of the season is always the most nerve-wracking one because it's the first time you're competing and it counts so getting through those first 10 points wait like just riding the wave and letting you get through that and settle and then being able to play ball but it's just going to be them using their senior leadership to kind of help out those newbies on the court especially when your first game is in the Braska of your college career that's a big one to start with but being able to stay the course and being Fearless because again who cares that it's in NE brasket even if it is them on the court right then and there it's only 12 girls on the court doesn't matter about the name across the front of the Jersey you're going out there and you're playing volleyball to the best of your ability well two things happened last time these two teams met for one we got the longest rally in any match last season between Kentucky and Nebraska that rally that lasted over a minute that went viral on every social media platform after it happened so that should give you an indication of the kind of team Nebraska is you should probably remember they dig everything and that's probably going to happen again last year again kcki was so bad offensively early in the year we all went into that Nebraska match going oh this could be like double bad because they already are struggling to score and Nebraska digs everything but remember that match was the match where Kentucky found something they felt like they hit a switch and all of a sudden we're beginning to generate offense and when they can do it against a team as talented as Nebraska that's what set them up on that trajectory to do it against everyone else last year it's why they became one of the best offensive teams in the country allowing the the fact now that Brooklyn delay has seen a team like Nebraska she played them last year and now knows how do I recycle the point how do I tool the block how do I get it that's going to help I think Kentucky I don't think they're scared of Nebraska they weren't scared of them last year but you were coming off of an early preseason where you'd lost so much and where you were struggling so much offensively to some degree it was like well man this is going to be frustrating but they in the middle of that match really found something I think that could even carry over into this year because those players are still there there's still Brooklyn delay and imig grome focal points of the offense Megan Wilson was there last year Aaron lamb like there's still a lot of hitters that played last year and I think they're not going to be unfamiliar with the kind of of of play that Nebraska has you mentioned serving pressure Craig pointed out someone asked him what have you seen out of this team in practice early in the preseason and he said this is one of we again we said this last year a lot but he said the serving pressure that we're applying in the gym is unlike any team I've ever seen play here we I don't know if you noticed this when when Brooklyn played with the USA team this summer she has got a new hybrid jump Ser that reminds me Leah of what you unveiled this year in athletes unlimited that when she was getting it in which she was actually was surprised at how much she was getting it in how frequently it was Lethal it was almost impossible to not only keep the ball up but to keep it up in system I'm I'm intrigued to see if a she sticks with that and B if she can do it effectively enough to get Nebraska out of system along with the rest of the team it sounds like Craig is really really high on what this team can do from the service line which is an area that we haven't kuy's been good they've been solid in serve in Ser the serving game for the last several years I don't think they've ever been Elite and I think it's interesting that he's kind of pointed that out as one of the things he's noticed in practice early we'll see if this team can become that because if they can then you will have a chance in every big match you play whether you're playing Penn State Texas Nebraska Florida Louisville service pressure is the name of the game that's how you get the team out of system and it's how you win matches I'm going to be really intrigued especially Tuesday to see like you mentioned you have to get Nebraska out of system they are two talented offensively at the center position with Bergen riy and two talented offensively with our hitters if you don't get them out of system they will crush you so I'll be really interested to see what Kentucky can do from behind the service line next next Tuesday I think that's going to be one of the biggest keys of the game um along with like you said controlling your nerves limiting your errors you cannot have errors against a team like Nebraska they play you clean so you have to beat them because they will not give you points free um based off of their own errors you're just going to have to go out and get the point yourself get the kill yourself they're not going to give it to you so this is going to be a really interesting night Tuesday obviously the match after that after we get Kentucky Nebraska we get Louisville Wisconsin so it's going to be a really really awesome night of volleyball on ESPN I will be at the m center I live in Louisville now so now it's it's great that now they are right in my backyard for this first game um but I will be at the match Tuesday really really excited in general for what this is going to be it's a great event the fact that we're getting the first serve of the season in Louisville and then the last serve of the Season regardless of the teams will also happen in Louisville with the final four being here at the Y Center as well it's just really cool the fact that ABCA is doing this is such a a cool event in a great way truly a great way to kick out the volleyball season with it being on ESPN and being four of the best teams in the country so let's transition to you Leah let's transition to some Kentucky stuff that's that's um not current obviously you have played professionally Avery Skinner just won a freaking silver medal in the Paris Olympics congratulations to her and what the US team for doing that but let's talk about PVF uh and athletes unlimited obviously you won that when we were when we were talking last year still PVF you guys made the Final Four I don't know if you want to do a little quick recap of the PVF and then talk about when does athletes unlimited for the in the fall start for you this this year um so yeah PBF was super cool first season of that we had seven teams and it just like RI really well of course with the first season you're going to have some Growing Pains of learning new things um but it was super cool I think one of my favorite Parts about it was that we have this um program called bolt six um and it's basically where everything that happens on the court is now on a computer and you have about 12 different cameras angled at the court at any time and there are no line judges there are no one I mean even the down reps aren't really making as many calls anymore because the cameras see everything um it is a beautiful thing um the less that you have people and humans making decisions the better um because there were so many balls that I hit that if it was a person calling it it definitely would have been called out and not in so really helped my stat sheet out because I was like Yeah I'm all these balls in the Deep line like they're not out but it was super cool um I played in Atlanta um we did really well we were regular season Champs and went into the playoffs as a number one seed lost in the semis but it was a really fun season um super excited um to go back to Atlanta again and start in January um I'm not playing athletes unlimited this year you're not I have taken a Hiatus from athletes unlimited as deserve you deserve a rest I I have a torn lab rum in my shoulder and so playing basically a nine month season was really really brutal for my shoulder and to preserve my health for my Atlanta season I was going to take a little break from athletes unlimited but you'll still see me on TV because I'll be commentating and for the first time in my career I'm gonna do ESPN games so you'll see me on SC NW doing other SEC games as long as as well as Kentucky games which I am super excited about but yeah it's been a great off season for Kentucky volleyball in terms of the pro world we just all of us professional players just love Kentucky so much and getting to represent them on the bigest stages internationally is super super fun and it's just been a real Joy well and just because you are not playing there are still wild cats playing in the p in athletes unlimited Cass Brown is signed back on is is Johnny signed back on or is she doing just doing the coaching she's coaching so ter of athletes unlimited I believe the only Kentucky Wild Cat playing is Cass Brown is Cass yeah I think Gabby's out and I know alli's out too so you can still go watch cash he's still playing for Orlando so and we're adding what they're adding are they not they're adding Indian for PVF so PVF we will now have Indie in there as well but yeah me Cass um and z are all signed to teams for p F and then we're just going to have to wait and see and see if any of these Kentucky Wild Cats get drafted I think that's the cool part now is that we can people can get drafted and so a lot of the hopefully Kentucky Wild Cats that are playing right now as seniors will want to continue playing on but yeah there's only one athletes unlimited three in PVF right now and then others are overseas awesome well it's regardless of which team you're pulling for it's fun to see former Kentucky players in the actual League so you can still go watch profession professional volleyball in general is cool to see again whether ky's in it or not so if you still want to watch volleyball because you can never get enough if you're if you're like me and Leah then you can still watch all of that this this fall watch the athletes unlimited and obviously Leah will pick up PVF in January is that when you all start yes yes so pick up in January right after the conclusion of the college volleyball season so volleyball doesn't end anymore in December it now ends in like May which is great cuz used to you were done for basically 9 months until the next August but we don't have that anymore otherwise I think we're all finished up we will see you guys after the Nebraska match we're going to do a a recap of that one hopefully we'll be recapping a win will you be there today Leah have not figured that out yet we will see okay well if Leah is there we will do an episode in person if not we'll jump on we'll jump on on the computer and do it that way but otherwise we will see you guys the rest of the season episode one of season 2 is officially completed thank you all for joining us we will see you guys soon thank you Leo yeah [Music]