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Rams Volleyball Annihilating the Competition
By Dylan B. Tomlinson, Denver Post
Oct. 12, 1999
FORT COLLINS - The Colorado State women's volleyball team has played several roles since it rose to NCAA Division I prominence four years ago. National power has not been one of them. Despite four NCAA Tournament appearances in as many years, the Rams have always played stepsister to Colorado's Cinderella. But Colorado State is being overlooked no longer. As one of only three remaining undefeated Division I teams (Northern Iowa and Hawaii are the others), the Rams (16-0) have quickly emerged as one of the top teams in the country. It's not as if the Rams are coming out of nowhere. They went 24-8 and won the Western Athletic Conference title, while advancing to the second round of the NCAA Tournament last year before losing to the University of Illinois. With five returning starters, a repeat performance was expected, but going undefeated through the first half of the season has stunned everybody around the program. "I knew we'd be good,'' senior Catie Vagneur said. "I didn't know how good we'd be. I'm definitely surprised we're undefeated.'' The Rams started the season on an unbelievable high with a 15-9, 15-3, 17-15 sweep over the University of Colorado. They haven't come down yet. "It was a very big win for this program,'' CSU coach Tom Hilbert said. "It's a huge rivalry, and it's a very big deal anytime we beat CU. After they stomped us last year, it was like this year the shoe was on the other foot. It felt great to get a win like that.'' Vagneur said the win over CU was the perfect start to what has been an unbelievable season. "That was a great, great win,'' Vagneur said. "It gave us such unbelievable confidence. It definitely got things rolling for this season.'' It certainly did. The Rams haven't just been winning, they've been annihilating the competition. Fourteen of their first 16 wins have been sweeps. "It's kind of scary,'' sophomore Courtney Cox said. "It's one thing to be winning, but it's another to be able to control opponents the way we have. There have been a lot of 15-2 or 15-0 scores, and that always surprises me.'' Vagneur, an all-Western Athletic Conference selection last season, was expected to be the Rams' leader this season. She's been that and more, averaging 13.1 kills and emerging as an All-America candidate. "Catie just leads by example,'' CSU coach Tom Hilbert said. "She just makes all of the plays at crunch time and it eases the minds of everybody on the court. She has so much composure. It's just like "follow me' and everybody does.'' Hilbert said the emergence of Cox, a Skyline graduate, and CSU's only new starter, has been a huge reason for the Rams' success this season. Cox is averaging 12.5 kills a match, and after coming off the bench last season, she and Vagneur have given the Rams a top 1-2 combination. "Courtney showed flashes of brilliance last year, but she was inconsistent,'' Hilbert said. "Her progress has been astonishing. She's quite possibly the best natural athlete I've ever coached. She's a real hammer. And we get her here for two more years, her potential is unlimited.'' Cox attributes her improvement to practice, and having the chance to learn from Vagneur. "I've been very lucky to learn from someone like Catie,'' Cox said. "I really felt like I was getting a lot better this spring, but you never really know until the season starts. But without a question I wouldn't have been able to do this without Catie's help.'' The Rams are going to need help from the entire team if they are going to keep their winning streak going. CSU's schedule only gets harder in the upcoming weeks, as the Rams get deeper and deeper into Mountain West Conference play. Brigham Young is a national power, and UNLV and San Diego State have also had great starts. "BYU is our measuring stick,'' Hilbert said. "Our goal this year is not just to make the NCAA Tournament, but we want to host the first two rounds. To do that, we're going to have to be no worse than second in the MWC, and we probably can't lose more than twice in conference play. If we want to do that, we're going to have to beat BYU at least once. That's going to be very difficult, as will all of our play in this conference. There's a lot of parity in this conference this season.'' That's one of the reasons Hilbert is worried that his team has not been tested yet. Southwest Missouri gave CSU a scare during the first week of the season, and the University of Denver played over its head while taking the Rams to five games. Even though three of the wins have been over ranked teams, Hilbert said he wishes the team had been better tested during nonconference play. "We're not going to be able to win the way we've been winning in MWC play,'' Hilbert said. "CU is a national power and we swept them. Notre Dame is a great team and we swept them. We have to keep winning at home and stay away from bad losses. Part of me wishes we'd had tougher matches, but I'm impressed by our consistency. We haven't slipped up like we did at times last year.'' CSU has certainly impressed its competition this year. BYU coach Elaine Michaelis said she's been very surprised at the level to which the Rams have risen. "They've been great,'' Michaelis said. "They've always been good, but they're on a complete different level now.'' CU coach Pi'i Aiu said he was very impressed with what he saw from the Rams in the season opener. "I'm not surprised, they've always had a nice team, but they're a vastly improved program,'' Aiu said. "I thought we played pretty well against them, and they still took it to us. I take my hat off to Tom and his staff.'' CSU's success this season has beefed up the expectations for the rest of the year. Before the season, a top-three finish in the MWC and another trip to the NCAA Tournament would have been considered a success. But now the bar has been raised considerably, and the team is talking about winning the conference and advancing to the Elite Eight of the tournament, talk which would have caused laughter six weeks ago. "I think we have the talent to win the conference,'' Cox said. "It's not going to be easy by any means, but I think we can do it. I don't think our goals have changed that much since the beginning of the season, but they all seem reachable now.'' Hilbert said the team's success has caused him to view the season in a completely different way.
"I'm splitting the season into thirds,'' Hilbert said. "The first third was the non-conference play, and we've exceeded all of our expectations in that third. The second third will be the conference play where we'll have the chance to prove just how good we are. The last part is the postseason, and I think we have the chance to go further than we ever have before. It's very exciting.''
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