This weekend, the Mississippi State University volleyball team (1-3) played in their home tournament, the Starkvegas Classic, against Mississippi Valley State University (0-4), the University of Louisiana at Monroe (2-1), Georgia State University (2-1) and California Baptist University (4-0).
These matches marked the beginning of the Julie Darty era, who took over the program as head coach on Jan. 11, 2018–a roller coaster of a weekend it was, as the team played four matches within three days.
Friday was an exciting day in “the Griss,” as the 11 a.m. match against MVSU featured the cheers of local fifth graders. The students were treated to an outstanding blocking show, as MSU racked up 11 blocks in the match. MSU walked away from the match with a lot of confidence after beating MSVU in straight sets (25-19, 25-13, 25-13).
For the nightcap against ULM, the atmosphere at the Griss was “awesome,” for the team’s new head coach.
“I love turning around and seeing so many familiar faces in the stands,” Darty said. “I think that is a great sign that people are pulling for us and they understand it is going to be a long road. It is really nice to see so many faces here to support this program.”
Paige Shaw, a freshman from Hoover, Alabama, led the way against ULM with 13 kills. After the match, which MSU lost in four sets (19-25, 23-25, 25-21, 22-25), she credited her teammates.
“It feels really good, I have my team helping me and backing me up,” Shaw said. “They put me in a really good position to just play my best and help the team out.”
After going 1-1 on Friday, MSU fell to Georgia State University in four sets (21-25, 14-25, 25-22, 15-25). Despite the loss, Darty saw something impressive from her team, but she also saw room to grow.
“I was impressed today, a little more than yesterday, I thought we had a little more grit, a little more fight than last night,” Darty said. “I just told our captains, ‘There are going to be a lot of growing pains this year. Essentially, we are an entirely new team. Right?’ A new staff and new pieces–there is a lot of new–and I feel like we have some pieces to the puzzle, but I do not think we have all those pieces. We are trying new lineups and trying to figure out what works. The goal for us is to find a line-up that exposes our strengths and hides our weaknesses, and we certainly can tell our weaknesses at this point.”
The fight for wins would not get easier, as the next opponent was CBU, who made the NCAA tournament two years ago and is trying to make a push to reach this accomplishment again. MSU struggled, hitting an abysmal .027 as a team, and the team’s side-out stat stayed below 40 percent for most of the night, while also allowing CBU to make runs of 6-0, 14-3, and 9-1. MSU was defeated in three straight sets (16-25, 20-25,19-25).
“This weekend was a reality check for us. I think coming into this weekend, we never thought this was going to be a situation where we get one win, at our home tournament,” Darty said. “My hope is that we can find some kind of rhythm and some kind of momentum as we get into September, October.”
Darty said she loves having players who play many different positions, but she has not found the right look for her team and will keep making changes until the team finds a rhythm that works well.
“I really wish I could find some pieces that could get into a good rhythm and get some comfortability together,” Darty said. “I know I keep changing things, so nobody is really able to get into that good rhythm, but we are going to keep trying to find something that we feel good about, and feel like gives us that best shot to get a win.”
The MSU volleyball team will be in the gym this week preparing for the University of Clemson on Friday, in Boone, North Carolina, as part of the Appalachian Invitational. Clemson will be a tough test for the team, and they will have to work to prepare for it.
“They were at South Carolina this week, they went 1-2, so they are hungry for a win,” Darty said. “They are still trying lots of lineups. We have a lot of work to do as a staff to prepare a good scout for our team.”