Fans will have the opportunity to chat live online with several of UCF's head coaches in the coming weeks on UCFathletics.com, the official web site of UCF. Volleyball head coach Meg Colado will join the chat circuit Friday, July 8 at 11 a.m. The Golden Knights will be kicking off their first Conference USA campaign after dominating the competition in the Atlantic Sun. Colado has led her squad to three league titles and three NCAA Championship appearances since 2000. Send your questions now and check back on Friday to read Colado's answers. Fans can also submit questions during the chat session. Other guests that are slated to visit UCFathletics.com for the online chat include football head coach George O'Leary on July 14. Later in the summer, guests include men's soccer head coach Brent Erwin and women's soccer coach Amanda Cromwell. Check UCFathletics.com for dates and times of the guests as the weekly online chat continues through the summer. |
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| Jeff (Altamonte Springs): Coach Colado, First off, congratulations on the new additions to your family! How difficult will it be to find a replacement for the amount of offense that Emily Watts produced the last year and a half and who do you see as this year's "go-to" person? Thank you and Good luck this year! |
| | Coach Meg Colado: First off, good morning to everyone and thanks for joining me today. Thanks. the family is doing well. We have recruited several new players that we feel will give us a more balanced offense. Emily is a loss, but we feel confident with this group. |
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| Tim (Oviedo): Talk about the excitment of coming back to coach in a new conference after having three bundles of joy last season? |
| | Coach Meg Colado: The new conference is very exciting. We look forward to many more challenges. The overall competition will be greater from top to bottom and we look forward to some very exciting matches. |
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| Roxanne Petzold (Winter Park): Is there one setter or two setters running the offense this season? |
| | Coach Meg Colado: One setter. We will run a five-one. |
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| Hyatt (Orlando): Who are your assistants and why do you like them? |
| | Coach Meg Colado: Sam Ojie and Juanita Hitt are my very loyal and wonderful assistants. Sam brings many years of international experience and Juanita is our organizational guru. This staff compliments each other extremely well. |
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| Matt from Melbourne: How has entering CUSA helped in recruiting? |
| | Coach Meg Colado: We think that it has helped a lot. We can now recruit players to a more high profile conference. This conference has also opened the door for us to recruit more Texas players. |
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| Victor (Orlando): With you entering Conference USA, is there a chance you will be having Atlantic Sun foes like Stetson and FAU on the schedule this season? |
| | Coach Meg Colado: Yes. We play FAU on Sept. 20 at 4 p.m. at home. In the future, we will be playing some in-state schools. It is important to play in-state opponents. |
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| Andrew, NYC: How far and wide do you search for talent? Do you recruit internationally? |
| | Coach Meg Colado: We recruit all over the U.S and this year we will have the first two foreign athletes that I have coached. I think it is important to help keep players close to home, but that does not always work out for the program or the player. |
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| John (Winter Park): Coach, last year you had to throw a freshman into the setter position. Now that Leah Alexander has come to UCF, are you going to keep both of them at setter or are you going to move one of them to another position? |
| | Coach Meg Colado: The setting position will be decided after two-a-days. Both of these players will have a fair chance at becoming the 2005 setter. Neither one will play other positions that I can see right now. |
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| Mike (Pensacola): It?s great to have you back coach. What do you think is going to be your team?s biggest challenge this year? To add onto that, which team(s) do you think are going to be your toughest competition in conference. |
| | Coach Meg Colado: I think our toughest challenges are going to be developing team chemistry quickly with the addition of six new players. I do not want to underestimate anyone in Conference USA. These teams have been playing in tough leagues for awhile. |
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| Brandon (New Hampshire): Coach, the Outside Hitter position was one that you had some trouble with last year. Now that Emily Watts is out of the lineup, who are you looking at to step up and anchor the position? |
| | Coach Meg Colado: Lorin Lukas, who was a freshman last season, had a fantastic spring season. We look for her to challenge the new junior college players, Maina Heming and Vesna Ukic, for those positions. |
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| Lorenzo (Orlando): Coach, do we have the talent now to compete right away in C-USA? Also, can C-USA teams get more people out to our home games? |
| | Coach Meg Colado: I am optimistic about this year's team. However, I know that there is much more work to compete right away for the top few slots in this tough conference. I can only hope that the label of Conference USA will bring more students and more people from the local community out to see our home matches. I think it is going to be an exciting level of volleyball and one that you do not want to miss! |
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| Jeff, Orlando: I am guessing that the move to Conference USA is a step up in competition for all sports. How do you feel we will compete in this new league and is Conference USA a multiple bid conference when it comes to the NCAA tournament? |
| | Coach Meg Colado: Conference USA in volleyball has the tournament champion as the only automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament. Any at-large bids will be up to the selection committee. Thanks everyone for your questions. I look forward to seeing you all at our home matches this fall. Our schedule will be up soon! |
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| Brian (Jacksonville): Coach, you landed some big recruits this year and seem to be headed in the right direction. How do you think this move to conference USA is going to affect your team? |
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