Kentucky Volleyball kicks off 2021 season with Fan Day

The national championship was only four months ago, but the Kentucky Volleyball team is just 10 days away from the start of its next season.

The national championship was only four months ago, but the Kentucky Volleyball team is just 10 days away from the start of its next season. The reigning national champions played in front of a Memorial Coliseum crowd for the first time since before their run in Omaha as they hosted Fan Day on Sunday.

The event kicked off with some practice and drills and ended with a scrimmage (which I’ll have more on in a later post) that gave head coach Craig Skinner plenty to talk about in his first press conference of the new year.

With the first game of the season just 10 days away and only having practiced for four days, Skinner said there was “a lot to complain and work on” but also noted he saw a lot of positive from his new team.

When asked about his talented pool of underclassmen, which includes a pair of no. 1 ranked recruiting classes, Skinner said that “They bring a lot to the table. Now just trying to figure out what are the strengths that they currently have that can help us right away. What are the things they might need a year or two to work on. Lotta tools in the toolbox.”

He also said that “freshmen typically get worse before they get better” — a line John Calipari would concur with.

One freshman, in particular, stood out at the scrimmage (I’ll talk about her individual performance in a separate post), by the name of Emma Grome, possibly Kentucky’s next setter. After one preseason scrimmage, I personally am ready to declare her the heir to Madison Lilley.

She looked terrific, and I tried to get Coach Skinner to reveal whether she or senior Cameron Scheitzach would get the starting nod but he simply responded: “remains to be seen.”

He added that “she’s had some really good days. Today was one of ’em. Cam’s had some good days. Yesterday she was very good and her teams won a lot. It’s a great battle and they’re very supportive of each other.”

After Skinner, senior Alli Stumler and freshman Jordyn Williams answered some questions.

I asked Stumler right off the bat who had stepped up as the vocal leaders to replace Madison Lilley and Gabby Curry, who were great volleyball players but also great leaders.

Stumler said that she and the other two seniors (Lauren Tharp & Maddie Berezowitz) have talked about stepping into that role: “This year’s team is going to look at us three. So how can we take what we learned from the seniors last year, past seniors, and relay those things. Because we’re gonna have to be those vocal people.”

Those sound like the words of a team captain.

My favorite answer of the day came from the newbie. Jordyn Williams was asked how she felt about stepping into an “immediate spotlight” and she responded with an “I love it.” She was impressive in the press conference. Definitely mature beyond most college freshmen and had some thoughtful comments.

Here are the whole videos if you’d like to watch them: