Last weekend the Gators traveled to Omaha, Neb., and defeated Nebraska in front of a hostile road crowd.
This weekend, No. 6 Florida will return to Gainesville to host the Campus USA Credit Union Invitational to open its home schedule.
“It makes me a lot more confident,” freshman Chanel Brown said. “Especially to play with that kind of crowd in your season opener, I think it helped all of us realize how excited we are to come back to the [O’Connell Center]. We’re ready to play in front of Gator Nation and see a lot of orange and blue.”
Florida will start the event with a doubleheader today in the O’Connell Center, taking on Albany at 12:30 p.m. and then Bowling Green at 7:30 p.m. On Saturday, the UF will face No. 15 Colorado State at 4 p.m.
“Traditionally the new matches on Fridays aren’t a great draw, but I’m giving permission to anybody to skip work to come out,” coach Mary Wise said. “We’ve had great crowds surrounding the football game. That is not done on accident.”
Regardless of how many fans show up at the matches, the players seem to have mutual feelings about playing in front of the home crowd for the first time this season.
“We’re really excited,” junior Kelly Murphy said. “It’s always fun to play at home and we always have a great crowd.”
Murphy was named the Sports Imports/American Volleyball Coaches Association Division I National Player of the Week after recording the 16th triple-double of her career against Nebraska.
Her 20 kills, 23 assists and 10 digs helped the Gators jump from their previous spot of No. 13 in the rankings and gave UF its first national player of the week since Murphy was given the same honor as a freshman in 2008.
“It’s really cool but I think a lot of it had to do with how the team played,” Murphy said. “I think if we hadn’t played so well, none of it would have been possible.”
Although fewer and fewer teams are putting doubleheaders on their schedules, Wise sees it as a way to get more matches in and allow the team to improve. She also says there is little concern of physical weariness because the team is in great shape and it’s still early in the season.
Between the three matches, the Colorado State contest appears to be the biggest challenge of the weekend.
In 2008, the Rams defeated the Gators in straight sets in the beginning of the season. However, the Gators returned the favor at the NCAA Championships, defeating the Rams in three straight.
Wise made it clear that the team is unconcerned with rankings, instead focusing on the match at hand.
“We’re most concerned with what we can do against Albany, a team that has been in the NCAA Tournament multiple times,” Wise said. “It’s not getting caught up on last weekend or next weekend, it’s all about this moment.”
