E60: Wisconsin volleyball coach Kelly Sheffield and reporter Dennis Punzel

[Music] so [Music] hey welcome in it's the john cass podcast it is episode number 60 welcome into the podcast really excited about this one today podcast as always is brought to you by ian's pizza in madison with three locations in madison one in milwaukee one in seattle and one in denver we are currently working on our next promotion we've got a couple of ideas floating around that i really think podcast listeners are going to enjoy so check out ian's pizza if you're in madison or milwaukee seattle or denver or just come to madison and have a macaroni uh and cheese slice of pizza it's delicious um so ian's pizza thank you to them johncastpodcast.com go subscribe newsletter rate and review all the good stuff but let's get to today's episode because i'm really excited the volleyball coach at the university of wisconsin the national champion winning volleyball coach at the university of wisconsin kelly sheffield joins me along with badgers beat writer dennis punzel guys it's like point wisconsin again part version 2.0 or something like that how's everybody doing today kelly we'll start with you we're doing great let's uh let's go great to see you guys dennis what's going on well we're getting there uh yeah it's nostalgic yes it really is uh if you notice some issues with dennis's audio it's because uh dennis screwed up his microphone earlier so um just kidding i did that on purpose dennis did nothing it's just technology i'm going to dive on everyone right now aren't we what's that macgyver you know we're getting out the uh the duct tape and all kinds of things we were trying a whole bunch of stuff for a second i felt like an i.t person but then it didn't work um all right guys so a lot of off season news happening dennis i want to talk about the book that we had mentioned in the last podcast because i know you've got an update with that but kelly i wanted to start with the news that i saw recently that i it's got a lot of badger fans talking and that's the september 16th match at the kohl center against florida badger volleyball is moving from the field house for one match september 16th this is something that i've been just saying as a fan like why can't we play at the kohl center can we do one at the kohl center like hockey women's hockey does one of the cult like why can't we do one at the kohl center how matt imagine how cool that would be to fill that arena up and that's the plan right now can you tell me the background the story what's the story there behind wisconsin volleyball playing at the coal on september 16th yeah i mean it was well i think when we first got here maybe he's 13 or 14 or something i think i was asked if i had any interest in and go on there i didn't personally uh you know i wanted to the you know i i love the uh the the field house that we play in so let's try to continue to put upgrades in there let's try to bring that up to to where it's capable of being and um uh you know after this past season it was brought it was you know i was asked again do we want to we want to go there and play i wasn't interested but you know more thinking about it i mean we've been selling out here for you know seven eight years and there's just people that can't come in there and watch and so let's you know that's that's been kind of a philosophy as you saw this past spring we're going around the states and trying to play some different places maybe some people that aren't able to make the drive they don't have the time uh maybe that they're not able to get tickets we want to kind of take the show on the road a little bit i guess if you will and you know the kohl center allows us to to get more people to watch i think uh um we're excited about it yeah it's how did that um like come about did you have conversations with somebody like how did you find that date in particular too to to play against florida and why not a big ten school or was it always going to be a non-conference if that would ever happen um let's see i i think i think the last person that came to me and said something was katie smith uh and um my boss and uh right after the season he said that i wasn't interested and then i don't know probably about a month or so later uh started thinking yeah let's go ahead and and do this if we're gonna do it the right way you know i mean we've gotta we gotta promote it we've gotta you know we've gotta give him a great experience it's you know those pros and cons of doing that i mean you're getting you know the possibility of seventeen thousand fans in the building but you know the fans are further away from the action it's a you know the volleyball court is smaller than a basketball court so um you know we want to make sure that it's done the right way florida you wanted to do it against a you know a big-time opponent uh something that would people be excited to watch um it's uh weren't interested in doing something new for the first time in a conference match right you know so it's uh didn't really want to do it the first match out of the gates when we're dropping a uh a banner so there there really weren't a whole lot left you know but you know uh uh talked to mary at florida she's excited about it we're excited about it uh you know let's go yeah how important is it do you think to showcase the sport because my guess is i mean i think i think you have an excellent shot of beating that regular season attendance record of i think just over 14 000. um so how important do you think it is for the sport for the conference to to showcase volleyball in front of that many people and say listen this this can happen i think it's important that we continue to you know i i i how do we continue to give our players and our fans experiences that they that they enjoy that they remember you know i certainly want to be thinking about that how do we stretch the game how do we grow the game how do we get more people uh maybe to see what kind of uh uh what this sport is about you know it uh i think we need to continue to think outside the box and maybe we leave there that night and say man this is a horrible idea well you know but it but uh but on the other hand maybe we sit there and and uh there's 20 people in the stands that have never seen a a match live in person before and they leave there and they're inspired and they want to watch some more uh i think we continue to try to find ways to get on tv i think that you know it's not like this will be a match that will uh we'll be able to uh get covered as as we should um it's been it's been a while since those uh attendance records regular season have been um have been pushed you know most of us are playing a little bit smaller arenas and and um you know i think uh we just set we just set the attendance record for for the tournament uh let's go ahead and try to find a way to set up for the regular season as well um you know i think and you have no control over this but you know how cool it would be i think if then men's basketball played a game at the field house uh in in a non-conference and you guys got the kohl center for a non-conference i think that would be i think things like that are really fun for badger fans because it's something new it's something different than what they're used to so i'm all about this idea i think it's i think it's fantastic and i know you have we have no idea if it went well because we'll find out in september on september 16th but could you see this being a yearly tradition well i don't know as ask me after that you know i i that's certainly not something that um we're going into this thinking that way but it's uh you know i i thought it was cool that you know michigan state basketball a few years ago uh tried to try to play a game on an aircraft carrier i mean that's just that's just sweet i don't think it it didn't they weren't able to pull it off but the idea of that was pretty cool there's some volleyball teams that have been able to play in the pentagon and i think that's cool there's hockey games that are playing inside of uh football stadiums and that's just thinking outside the box you know and uh um tapping yeah it's uh we'll we'll see how this goes and maybe this is a one-shot deal maybe it's something we try to do later on down the road you know now i think about it maybe once every year it could get maybe once every other year i don't know it's just it's sometimes i i also wanted um badger hockey to play at camp randall once a year too so i don't know because i went to one of those and that was cold but it was a lot of fun and something different um so the one of the other things uh with the program is well i'm wondering i'm curious what is the seating at the field house how's that renovation number one going um that you've seen the progress over that and will we have different uh seating at the field house coming up john it is it is like a war zone and it has been in theirs for months it is crazy how many workers are in there i mean there's stuff everywhere there's dust everywhere um it's uh it's it's unbelievable that uh you know one of the cool things yeah there's going to be new seating we've got premium seating chair backs which is something we've heard from a lot of our fans uh you know we do these year-end surveys and and uh for since i've been here that's been something that people have asked for and so if you get chair back seating obviously you're gonna lose some some seats and and you know it's there's give and take right i mean there's just no way possible to make everybody happy but it's uh it's an option people are gonna have that option to be able to to have to to sit there that'll be the section right behind the scores table right behind the benches all of that so we'll lose some seating along the way uh we've had to add some ada seating that's something that we've known we've had to do for a few years um and it is really really important and so when you're adding a bunch of that a lot we've got a big section of it right above the premium seating so you're going to lose even some more seating because of that um it's uh the this part in the south end that goes in and out of the coal center or the coal center camp randall right um will be another area for premium seating that will be a place where people can grab food and drinks um and we're certainly excited about that and then um air conditioning you know we added some air conditioning a few years ago but it didn't bring down the temperature of the entire place i'm told we're going to be able to get the field of house down to 70 degrees if we want to which is going to be obviously somebody that's way up there in the top this is a game changer but that's a big reason why there's so many people in there is that uh the piping that's going all the way through there is just is is incredible but you know i'm obviously you know we're going to lose a little bit of seats that's that's a little bit of a bummer uh the cost to get in that they're going to be raising raising that and you know you're a little bit nervous that maybe you'll be pricing people out or they decide to take their dollars and and do something else one of the great things has been the value uh of coming to a match and um and the prices price is going to go up in some cases considerably but it's probably to be expected when you're thinking over the last nine years a new floor a new video board new locker rooms new lighting new sound system air conditioning seating uh you know that they got they got all the bees and the wasps that used to fly over there most of those out of there it's um the concourse area the the windows the outside of the building it has been an incredible incredible investment that has gone in and you know that's one of the things i'm excited about is that when people are asking for things that you know the that there's been a willingness to uh uh of the administration to go and and make some of these really big-time changes and uh you know there's gonna be there's going to be a little bit of a cost to that and we hope really hope that people uh stay with it a couple of questions and i got one for you dennis uh you mentioned the 70 degrees you're gonna be able to that's next year you're going to be able to get that place to 70 degrees what you're telling me okay i'll let you know okay i'll let pete know not to bring the fans the little tiny fans he brings up uh we may not need those anymore um and you also mentioned the concourses uh this is just a a fan question and the fan me asking this question uh will the trophy be on display around the concourse i don't know how you would do that or where it would go but are there plans to kind of showcase some of some of those uh awards all right so what we've decided to because i mean we're still it's still a war zone right down there i was walking on my way up to the office today and it is so much stuff in here i mean it's it's it's just insane uh the concourse how we want to do it is there's just not enough time to do that and so it'll probably look somewhat similar to what we have had there'll be a place probably a table for um for the trophies uh i would think after our season is over that is a plan of building some trophy cases and really updating um the concourse in a in a much better way than it is right now uh we're hoping that there's been so much like storage in the concourse and um we're trying to get everything out of the concourse that has been there for decades that have just kind of accumulated and hopefully fans will have a little bit more elbow room it'll be visually more appealing obviously as well safer um get all that stuff out of there and then really take that extra space and probably do some things that you know that uh will be able to showcase the trophies in the history and and be able to do some fan act uh interaction stuff in there it's fantastic i want to ask more about the product uh the team that we'll see out on the court in 2022 but dennis rapunzel badgers beat writer for the university of wisconsin volleyball team is on the podcast as well now we've got a little connection issue dennis but that's all good and dennis you have some some news of your own because last time you're on this podcast you talked about the book you're going to be writing about the 2021 badger season and uh congratulations that's all done you wrote a book uh that's so cool so let me ask you how does it feel how does it feel writing your first book like something i never thought i would do i i had no uh real ambitions to do one and the only ambition i had i kind of put away a couple years ago and was told to be thankful you gave up on that idea and then somehow it came around again and it felt really really good typing the last sentence of the book it was really emotional oh wow that's awesome so as you're doing this process what was like the hardest thing about writing a book on the 2021 season um and what was something that perhaps was a little easier than you thought it would be you know the hardest part was not putting it off i knew it was a very uh short time frame because to make this work we had to get the book out by before the season starts you know we don't have a release date yet that's but and the book is still in the process of being put together by the publisher right now i get texts and emails every day on the progress of that but as it got closer to my deadlines i should have probably started doing this a little like in february i should have been doing more but i was always going to do that tomorrow and um but i work better on deadlines so we pushed it pretty hard and uh most people that i talked to who have done books that you're gonna do it in two months you know ridiculous um that was about the turnaround time was a couple months and uh that the other concept you know i'm used to working in thousand word increments you know a newspaper story which is maybe 750 to maybe occasionally i sneak it over a thousand um and to write a book of 60 000 words i didn't know what that meant that was a foreign language to me and yet once i broke it down the chapters kind of fell into place and it was easier that way i felt like i was writing 15 books of you know whatever how many uh words about two thousand two thousand uh i think the longest one is maybe seven thousand words dennis how many you had uh over a decade of articles and interviews that you're kind of going back on but how how many people do you think that you uh you interviewed or talked to uh for for this book i should go back and count i'm sure i'm guessing there's over 20 and i said one of the most fun parts for me because the book is really kind of two parts one is kelly's story his path from muncie to madison and everywhere in between and talking to people who played for him at albany i talked to the guy who hired him at albany um talking to former dayton players i thought probably two or three or four from each of those schools um the women from albany who i thought the one who was a freshman the year kelly came in and won four four matches that year and and 14 of the 17 players quit and she was one of the three that's stayed on and uh her senior year played in the ncaa tournament um that was fun it's fun to that was the part i enjoyed because it's a part that i knew less about the wisconsin part it was how do i tell a story that i've already been telling incrementally for nine years and and make it sound fresh so was there anything that you learned i mean you just talked about some of the non-badger um story lines like with kelly's career but was there anything else that you learned that you didn't know in the process of writing this um well there were there were good stories from the transition time here the first is first season um the things that went on and it was it was a big turnaround for a team that hadn't been in the tournament for five years and things were going to be done differently that was interesting um i uh who else did i talk to i talked to the going back the ways the woman who was the coach at bowling green at the time and kelly had been a club coach there and living the good life of club coaching and bartending and going around during the summers and working at camps and and after a couple of years this woman denise vandewali really liked him and just kind of sat down to kelly what are you doing with your life and it was kind of what if i ever thought about getting into college coaching and that's kind of what set him on the path and i said you know everybody in life has some some turning point it kind of sets you in the direction that you end up being and that seemed like that conversation was one of those inflection points that was really fun to hear discussed you know kelly what is that like to be able to when this book is released to be able to have a basically a record as a background of your uh coaching history and then of the 2021 season i mean have you thought about how how unique of an opportunity it is to have this just like written down because not everybody gets a like a book about um the season it was uh it was totally outside of both of our comfort zones you know i mean that's that's writing a book is i mean it's uh it is crazy what dennis has has had to go through and i remember him and i talking uh about having numerous conversations it was a little bit scary going in i think he would he would say that you know and certainly um uh you know there's there there's stuff about i i told dennis hey right take it whatever directions that you want to um and it certainly would be a lot more comfortable if there was none of it uh on me that it was totally geared towards the players and uh current and past and uh and telling their story i understand why it went the direction that it that it did uh but um you know and there's there's a few things in there that you know that i'd rather not i wish weren't in there but you know it's a bit i think you try to try to be truthful and tell the tell the whole picture but it's uh um you know i i enjoy doing things like this like what we're talking you know and talking to you and and talking to you know promoting our program and talking about our kids um but at the end of the day it's it's it's about them and uh you know um it's uh it's it's not a place of comfort when you're reading pages about yourself i can promise you that um interesting um another book question dennis real quick um did you reach out who did you reach out to about this because i'm sure you because like you said this is the first time you've ever done anything like this 60 000 words um who did you reach out to and what were some of the the tips that they gave you about about writing this well yeah i've talked to uh one of my mentors rob zaleski was the sports editor at the cap times who brought me to town he was also my first sports editor in green bay back in 1975 and he hired me at the cap times and he's written a few books and he he's not a volleyball person at all doesn't know much at all about the sport but whenever we talk he he'd say that kelly sheffield that story is a book that story's got to be told and that kind of pushed me in that direction to do make that part of the book i talked to uh lee feinswag from volleyball meg we know he was a guest every year on the podcast which by the way uh i know i showed you the cover uh coincidentally the name of the book or the the main title is point wisconsin um which has a familiar ring yes uh but but talking to lee the first time this was back in 2019 i have because he'd written several books i asked for tim for advice and he's his best advice was don't do it and i and i took that advice for three years and uh then i finally uh went away from it uh i i the hardest part for me that the biggest discomfort was how do you find a publisher i had no clue and who out there in the publishing world has had gonna publish a book from by somebody they never heard of about a sport they probably don't pay much attention to and i didn't know how to go about it i had no connections i talked to a few people tom hodge court um who has done several books and uh he recommended this kci sports publishing in stevens point um i talked to diane nordstrom my friend and she went through people in the department and who had a couple books done through kci sports so i thought you know i'd heard of them i knew of them i used to work in stevens point years and years ago and that sounds like the winner but i was afraid to contact them because if they said no i said well then who um yeah and i so i decided i i was afraid to get no for an answer so i didn't ask the question and after a couple weeks of dawdling i just one day said all right i'm gonna send the guy an email peter clark i i had his name i had his email and sent him a few a little synopsis of what i was working on and wondering if he would have any interest in doing a book and thinking i'd hear him back hopefully in a week or two well five minutes later i get an email he is very excited about that idea and would love to talk to me in five minutes after that we're on the phone wow boom we're talking um the conversations going on and you know it was like oh we'd have to it'd have to be a short turnaround that would be the the trickiest part and as the conversation went on he you mentioned the guy uh phil hebner i don't remember what the context was i said oh yeah i remember phil peter he played point guard for spash and uh point uh the other guard was tom clark he said well tom that's my brother and so i'd written about his brother and then he tells me about i've got a scrapbook right here that my mother kept of articles you did on my brother back in 1970 something wow well okay so i think this is meant to happen yeah wow that's awesome it's been a good relationship and he's been real helpful uh pushing this through we came down and we met with kelly uh one day for a while and talked about stuff and right now we're assembling photos kind of 100 miles apart which is always a challenge but um he's he's putting things together right now so but that was the hardest that was the part i was most uncomfortable with was publishing and it's turned out to be uh one of the the easier parts of it from my end that's so cool just send the email dennis five minutes later you get a response 10 minutes later you're talking yeah what's the problem people just put on a book yeah um and by the way i'm i'd like to do a podcast with you later on when when the book is published uh i want to take a read and i want to talk about the book with you so i think that would be a really fun podcast if you're interested in doing that sometime in later this summer as always because you know one of you know you mentioned the hard parts and that the hard part of this book is going to is still ahead and that's going to be the promotion stuff yeah because as as you know this is probably not not my uh favorite part of things but uh yeah well exactly you did with the book um all right kelly to wrap up this podcast i did want to talk a little bit about the players uh that we'll see on the court in 2022 because we haven't really had a chance to talk about some of the new faces that'll be uh on the badgers roster this upcoming season um i don't think we've talked about caroline crawford um but what about some of these new faces like like her like gabby mccaw um like sarah franklin who we haven't had a chance to speak of michigan state transfer what can you tell us about some of these new faces on the roster in 2022 well anybody that saw us in the spring saw a little bit about caroline crawford we call her cece great competitor uh the kid wants she wants to be really really good uh but you know she just she's locked in all the time i mean every every moment of practice and she just she's open to learning a fierce competitor um you know middle uh and um works we're excited about her there's there's a lot of strength a lot of toughness that comes from her um gabby transferred we were just able to she's been here for a few weeks um transferred from boston college we got to know her back in in high school she came here on a visit a couple times uh originally committed to southern cal with the coaching change she went to boston college played out there for uh what the last three years very experienced he'll probably be one of the you know there won't be too many people on our roster that has played in more matches uh than what gabby has um sarah franklin uh transferred from michigan state uh all big ten player outside and uh you know i talked to you know our strength coach who gave me a call the other day and said i'm gonna tell you what this kid is on a mission uh said she has maybe the biggest presence on our team in the weight room uh certainly one of the top ones uh you know uh i got it i got a text message from one of our players the other day said man she is every time she is around whether it's out on the sand courts or in the the gym when they're when they're playing um their teammates are pretty pretty fired up to uh getting what uh or seeing what they're seeing um so we're excited about sarah she's got three more seasons for us um uh ella roble is starting nationals her uh au nationals this week uh down in florida she's i they'll probably be one of the favorites to win a national championship she is certainly talking with her before she goes down there she's possessed you know right now to be able to do that she'll be here you know she'll land sunday after nationals and i think uh sunday morning she'll be here sunday afternoon um and and joining the team so next week for this weekend she'll be here excited about her uh golche goodakin is uh from turkey a libro from turkey she's preparing for the european championships that also julie orzell will be playing in uh in the uh in july i'm looking i'll be flying over there to italy to to watch both of them play uh gold shade will be here uh probably about 24 hours before we start our team meetings uh in in pre-season so we've got quite a few new kids looking at my board to make sure i'm not forgetting every anybody but i think i think i touched on all the newbies okay i would ask a little bit about how these pieces fit together on the court but we know that that's a process that that is going to be ongoing maybe up until the the final match of the year as well with little little wrinkles in the lineup so i won't ask you about that but uh a ton of new talent coming in for badger fans to keep an eye on in in 2022. guys that's the podcast point wisconsin um basically so uh i appreciate both your guys's time dennis once again congratulations on on writing the book we'll talk about it again later and kelly will we'll hook up again this summer uh with us three here and we'll we'll do another one of these sounds great cool thanks all right there you go that is uh dennis punzel kelly sheffield on this podcast like to thank uh ian's pizza in madison once again with three locations in madison one in milwaukee thank you to ian's pizza for being a sponsor of this podcast also check out johncastpodcast.com now you can sign up for my newsletter i'm not going to spam you i'm just going to give you cool uh stuff that i'm doing on the podcast so whether that's a contest or a promotion or whatever a cool guest we have coming up on on the podcast that's what you're going to get out of my newsletter and always a rate of review on your podcast platform that you're listening to this on always helps the podcast help support this podcast so thank you for continuing to do that takes seconds to leave a rate or a review um all right thanks for listening to this edition of the johncast podcast goodbye see ya