Volleyball Team Has Killer Season

When Genny Volpe joined Rice as the head volleyball coach in February 2004, she sensed her squad was ready to take its game to new heights. Turns out she was right. The team had its most successful season in Rice history, culminating with a bid to the NCAA tournament.

“From the moment I came here,” Volpe recalls, “I could feel the urgency of the team and the girls’ desire to do better than they had in the past and to set a precedence for the future.”

The players, too, thought it could be their year. “We knew what we were capable of and expected nothing less of ourselves,” says senior Rebecca Kainz, a middle blocker. “With a great new coach and coming off an incredible spring season, I think the team felt like it was finally our time to show everyone how great we were.”

The team displayed its talents by posting a 12–1 conference record—its only loss was to volleyball powerhouse Hawaii—and a 25–5 overall record.

The Owls hoped to avenge the loss to Hawaii in the Western Athletic Conference tournament, but the team lost to Nevada in the second round and didn’t have the chance for a rematch with Hawaii.

Without the WAC championship, the Owls didn’t receive automatic entry to the NCAA tournament; instead the team had to count on an invitation. “We were on pins and needles,” Volpe recalls. “When we got the selection, we made history by being the first Rice volleyball team to make it to the tournament, and that was such a great feeling.”

The players were just as excited as their coach. “We had already accomplished so much during the season, and we wanted it to end with a bang,” Kainz says. “We all just wanted to play our best as a team and see where that led.”

The Owls were eliminated in the first round by the University of Michigan. Volpe says it was a good match but admits, “It’s not the way we wanted to end the season because I know that, going in, our team felt like we could have made it to the second round.”

The NCAA first-round loss didn’t detract from the team’s successful regular season. Perhaps the most impressive streak was the home record of 11–0. Volpe describes that feat as “phenomenal” and notes that it helped to build fan support. Even so, she’d like to see bigger crowds next season. “A lot of that is earned,” she says, “so that fact that we had a good season and that the future looks bright for our program, I hope, will make students want to come see us play in the future.”

The volleyball team will lose four strong seniors, including star player Rebeca Pazo, who in 2004 became Rice’s all-time kill leader. Her 452 kills were third-highest in the WAC, and she ranked in the top 10 in hitting percentage, aces, and digs. Pazo received all-region honorable mention from the American Volleyball Coaches Association and was nominated for all-America honors.

But look out because Rebeca Pazo’s twin sister, Olaya, and other formidable starters will be back. Volpe says that her goal is to stay consistent, adding that the team has the talent to have another successful season.

“Next season is going to be interesting,” says sophomore Tessa Kuykendall. “We still have a lot of skill on the team, with more to come from the incoming freshmen. And with a very talented coach, I feel we still can compete at the top of our conference.”

The team will join Conference USA starting next season, and until then, the Owls will concentrate on the spring schedule, summer volleyball camps, and of course, academics.

Volpe notes that members of the volleyball team are very strong student–athletes. “It’s not easy to be a student–athlete at Rice, especially this season, when the girls had to compete in the NCAA tournament with finals coming up,” she says. “They did a really nice job of balancing their time and staying on top of their studies.”

—Dana Benson