Everything Eve Rackham Watt said after No. 9 Tennessee’s 3-1 win over No. 22 Vanderbilt

KNOXVILLE, Tenn. – Tennessee volleyball head coach Eve Rackham Watt met with the media after the No. 9 Lady Vols beat in-state rival No. 22 Vanderbilt 3-1 Sunday at Food City Center, their seventh straight win.

Rackham Watt spoke on the good, as well as how her team came out in the second set, when the Commodores bounced back from a 25-15 loss to even the match. Her message going into the third was simple: that was the Vanderbilt team she expected, and Tennessee had to be better. The Lady Vols responded by hitting .355 in the third set and closing the fourth with Maggie Dostic accounting for the final three points.

She also praised Kennedi Rogers’ 18-kill afternoon, Jalyn Stout’s growth in her role, and a group of young middle blockers she would put up against anybody in the country.

Here’s everything Rackham Watt said after the match.

What she has learned about this team during the seven-match win streak

“I don’t know if I learned it, because I thought it going into the season, but we got a group of really competitive kids that really want to win, and they’re fighters, and they don’t back down in any situation. They don’t get fazed when the game gets tight. They’ve responded so well in some really tough situations when the game has gotten tight. There’s been just a fearlessness about them. I felt that going into the season. I knew that about some of their personalities, but just how they’ve come together over the last couple of weeks and stretch, that’s been tough. In terms of opponents, we’ve been in some situations and they’ve just found their way out of them.”

Who has improved the most over the course of the season

“It’s a tough question to single any one player out. I think they all continue to get better. I think you’re all seeing the evolution of [Maggie Dostic] in terms of what her total game has brought. She doesn’t necessarily do one thing for us, but she does everything for us. I’ve kind of said from the beginning she’s the glue for us, and I think she’s really developed into that role. I certainly think Chelsea Sutton, as she’s gotten healthier, has really improved. Obviously she was a tremendous player, but we didn’t have the same version of her early just because of the injury. So she’s been able to get back a little bit closer to full strength.

"It’s really hard to, again, single [out] one player. I think they’ve all continued to evolve and get better and develop, and that’s been, again, I think a strength of this team. They’re interested in improving. They really are. They want to get better. So they haven’t rested on the fact that we’ve had some success. They really are in the gym trying to improve their game.”

What brings out the best version of Kennedi Rogers

“Well, I think she’s a rhythm player. So she’s out there all the time, and I think the more she’s involved, the better she is. She’s new to playing six rotations, and so that role for her I think is great because of that. She can stay in her rhythm. I think the more ball she sees, she can start to heat up and the connection starts to get better. And again, it’s not just her front-row play, it’s the back-row attacks. I just think for her, she was great today. She led us. It’s like she had, I would say, 18 quiet kills. It was kind of like she led us offensively, but it wasn’t the same way the whole time. So I was just really proud of the way she managed her game.”

The key adjustments after the second set

“Well, I just didn’t think we responded well in the second set. I told them, Vandy was uncharacteristically kind of messy in that first set. That’s not been them all year. So I didn’t expect they were going to play that way in the second set, and they didn’t. I think my team, no matter what we said, they were kind of surprised that Vandy was playing as well as they were. So I talked to them going into the third about, that’s the team I expected to show up.

"So we’re going to have to match that and we’re going to have to exceed that, and we’re going to have to prove that we’re the better team by the way we play. I wasn’t pleased. We came out a little bit lax, I think, in that second set, which happens in volleyball when one set kind of can get lopsided. But Vandy’s a great team. They had a great season. So I expected that response from them, and I was just proud of the way my team responded in the third.”

Jalyn Stout’s growth in her role

“Similar to Maggie in the sense that they just do a little bit of everything for us. They’re primary passers, they’re great defenders, they’re really good servers, and we need them to block and hit too. Jalyn is such a high-IQ player. She’s so fast. Some of the stuff she does, if you don’t know volleyball well, you may think it’s easy or that a lot of players do it. But the way she can pass and get in rhythm as a front-row player is really unique, especially as fast as we set her the ball.

"She’s a tremendous athlete. Over the course of the season, she’s evolved. She’s gotten better. She’s understood her responsibility a little bit more because, again, it’s a new role for her. That’s something she hadn’t played the last couple of years. She’s getting better and better, and I think you just see the growth in her game in all facets.”

What Anni Tang, Camille Perry and the young middles have brought

“I think that’s why I said it’s really hard to single out one player, because we’ve got Anni [Tang], we’ve got Camille [Perry], obviously Jolene Oddo. Those freshman middle blockers are so talented, and they all bring something a little bit different. I thought the way Anni started the match and the way Camille finished the match was really good. It gives us a little bit different look in terms of what their strengths are, gives us a little different look offensively, and so the rhythm for the other team can be off.

"Those guys, they’ve just gotten better. They came in last spring really hungry to learn and improve. They’ve done that. I think they’ve really embraced their role, whether they’ve been starters or they’ve come off the bench. They’ve all kind of been in both spots. I look at it as, hey, we’ve got really, really good middles, and I would put them against anybody in the country in terms of what they can do as a group. They’ve bought into that, and that’s a big, big piece of this team’s success.”

Preparing for another tough road trip at red-hot Texas A&M

“It’s the same. This league is what it is. Every weekend you’ve got to be prepared, and you go into somebody else’s gym and it’s going to be a dogfight. It’s going to be hard to win. Walking into somebody else’s place, they expect to win. They’ve got the talent to win. So your team has to come in physically prepared, mentally prepared, maybe even more importantly, for the matchup. So this week, we’re off tomorrow, but then we’ve got game prep this week.

"And then we’ve got to look back at this past week for ourselves and say, where do we need to get better? So a lot of focus will continue to stay on us. We’re just over halfway through October, so there’s a lot of volleyball left to play, and there’s a lot for this team to continue to improve on. It’s no surprise everybody in our league is good, and so we’re expecting that next week.”

Areas the team still needs to improve down the stretch

“I think it depends on the week. I would say, in general, there’s just some consistency that we need to continue to work through in our first-ball offense. I think the consistency of that has been better at times, but I still would like it to be a little cleaner. I think our transition game was a little bit better than it was earlier in the year, but I still think we can be better in our first-ball phase.”

The team’s grit in close matches after beating two ranked opponents

“I think they came into both matches this past week with a high level of belief in their ability and in their team. Again, we were in really tight situations last week against Kentucky, and today the same thing. I mean, 19-19 in the fourth, we had to make a play. Vandy was not going to make an error. I knew they weren’t going to. I told the team in the timeout, we’re not waiting for them to make an unforced error. We’re going to have to go out and pass the ball and take a swing and cover, or go back and hit a serve.

"So proud of the way Maggie played at the end of that fourth set. She took some really big swings in some critical moments and obviously finished it with that ace. Just really happy for the group in terms of their response when it got tight. You just see it in their face. They just don’t get fazed. There’s a maturity about them that you don’t always get. So we just talked about that, like, be mature in those moments. Understand we’re going to have to make a play. That’s what it feels like in those big-time matches.”

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