Sunday, Aug. 31, provided Tennessee volleyball with its first match of the season against the No. 15-ranked Purdue Boilermakers.
Following the loss, the Lady Vols returned home for the beginning of a two-day gauntlet of three different games, the first coming against Wofford on a Thursday.
The first of three games started with a similar feeling to what was left after the loss to Purdue in Nashville. The Lady Vols dropped the initial set against Wofford, 25-22, in a back-and-forth battle.
After being outscored 1-4 in their last five sets, a switch flipped on the sideline for the entire Lady Vols team. The spark started with Paityn Chapman and Starr Williams, finishing the Wofford match with 13 kills each.
After winning the next three sets over Wofford, things turned over to a doubleheader matchup on Friday against Samford and Winthrop, respectively.
“It’s hard to win set after set after set,” head coach Eve Rackham Watt said. “And so I think what we did the last two matches was massive, just being as clean as we were.”
The impressive run continued into Friday’s game as the Lady Vols swept Samford 3-0 in a quick game between the two squads.
The momentum didn’t stop there. The next game against Winthrop, just three hours later, ended with the same result — a Lady Vols sweep.
Since dropping their first contest of the year, the Lady Vols outplayed their opponents, scoring 9-1 over ten sets. The key to this? Rackham Watt doesn’t see it as just one reason for the team’s success.
“I’m really proud of this group for the response, especially after that first set against Wofford,” Rackham Watt said. “They’ve been really clean after that, even bouncing in between a couple of different lineups. I’m not sure that there’s one key to success, but right now it’s just things that are clicking.”
It’s a culmination of many different aspects of the game coming together at once, including much more net presence on the defensive side.
The intensity from blocking at the net has been infectious; three different Lady Vols earned four blocks against Winthrop, including Mackenzie Plante, Chelsea Sutton and Zoe Humphrey.
“I think coach established in practice, and she’s been preaching it, that we want to be a block team,” Rackham Watt said. “We’ve been really going hardcore on making sure we get those block touches, making sure we get those digs.”
Plante, who spent time coming off the bench her last two seasons, has grown into her own in the early goings of this season. Against Winthrop on Friday, posted nine kills while playing all three sets.
“I’m so happy for Mackenzie because she’s worked so hard to put herself in this position,” Rackham Watt said. “She’s been kind of off the bench the last two years, so it’s cool to see her have this junior year where she’s really shining and helping us so much.”
Plante joins a handful of other Lady Vols who have already started filling out into their own in the early stages of the year. Hayden Kubik continued to shine after having a career high in kills just a few hours prior; she earned 10 more kills against Winthrop.
Transfer Humphrey also made noise on the court Friday, posting her best numbers as a Lady Vol yet with 10 kills over just 13 attacks.
Tennessee’s next matchup will serve as quite the test as it faces a rematch from last season’s NCAA Tournament first-round battle against Georgia Tech. The game begins at 6:30 p.m. ET on Tuesday, Sept. 9.
