Are players-only meetings useful? There may not be stats to prove it one way or the other, but the Arizona volleyball players certainly believe it helped them come together so they could defeat No. 8 Kansas in a 3-2 (25-22, 21-25, 27-29, 25-20, 15-13) match on Friday evening in McKale Center. After an extremely disappointing effort against Kansas State on Wednesday evening, the Arizona Wildcats stayed in the locker room without head coach .
They talked about the near-misses that ended in losses. They talked about the disappointing match against K-State. And they talked about how to turn things around.
“I think after our talk on Wednesday, after the match, you could tell the whole team was pretty tired of losing, that we wanted to go in and start grinding and working hard, knowing that we could still come back and we could still prove ourselves, to everyone, and show them what Arizona is about,” said junior outside hitter . How could they accomplish that? “I think being aware we weren’t finishing games the past two weeks, maybe,” said fifth-year opposite . “So being aware of that and holding each other accountable throughout practice and even the past day.
We assign each other a partner to keep them accountable. And I think just having that one person hold you accountable for your mistakes has been a huge improvement for us.” It helped to have Wilson go off, as well.
She blew by her previous career high of 22 kills. Her 37th kill came on the last point of the nig.