When Charita Stubbs took over the volleyball team after being hired as coach in February, she inherited a program that was 7-23 overall and 1-21 in the ACC in 2005 and in need of rebuilding. So going 2-29 in her first season and 0-22 in ACC play wasn’t as disheartening as the way the team lost the matches, she said.
“I had expected a lot more five-game matches, meaning we would have fought a lot harder, drew the matches out a little bit more,” Stubbs said. “So that was probably the most disappointing factor that we didn’t put ourselves in a position to make matches a lot closer sometimes.”
But she said the team’s struggles in her first season haven’t dampened her enthusiasm or expectations for the program. If anything, she said the season has helped her team find out how to win in the future.
“The kids know what it takes to win, and that didn’t necessarily show in the matches as far as [wins] are concerned. But I think they have a better understanding of what it takes to be competitors,” Stubbs said. “They understand now what it really takes to be successful in this league, at least I hope that’s what they understood.”
Stubbs noted the important thing is to make sure the players understand improving is a daily need. She said if they don’t take such an approach, the team won’t get better.
“If you’re staying stagnant, you’re not putting yourself in a position to become the best that you can become,” Stubbs said.
While Stubbs said winning is a top priority, she said the losses this season have provided great learning opportunities that might not have materialized if the team had seen more success.
“When you lose, you can pinpoint a lot of different things and say, ‘This is the reason why the team struggled.’ When you win, you don’t have that opportunity as much, and so I’ve been critical – and some would probably say too critical – of the team,” Stubbs said. “But it just comes from the high standards and the expectations that I have on them.”
After four winless ACC seasons in the past five years – including this season – she noted it has been a challenge to change the team’s mentality. She said her staff has tried to instill in the players that “losing is unacceptable.”
“For a lot of them, that’s a foreign substance to them, like,’OK, well, what does that mean?’.” Stubbs said. “They need guidance. They need direction on how to attain that particular goal.”
As for whether her first season has changed her expectations of what it will take to rebuild the program into a winner, Stubbs said it hasn’t.
“This year is a building year. When I sit back and I think about it, it’s about getting better. It’s about setting the standards as to what you’re expecting. It’s about setting the standard out there and saying, ‘This is what we’re going to be about as a team,'” Stubbs said. “And I think we’ve set that.”
And after being close to pushing matches to fourth and fifth games or winning matches this season, Stubbs said next year’s team should be “a completely better and different team.” It’s a change she said she would welcome after hearing from people around the program about how close her team is to breaking through with wins.
“That’s no consolation to me. I don’t want to be close,” Stubbs said. “I want to be there.”
