Oct. 3, 2008
What do you get when you combine UCF volleyball with the No. 3 team in the country, a 1978 national champion team, the opening of a new arena and a football ticket giveaway? An electrifying atmosphere.
That is what the Knights' volleyball squad experienced on Tuesday, Sept. 2 when they played the six-time national champion Stanford Cardinal in front of a capacity crowd of 1,568 to open The Venue at UCF and welcome first-year head coach Todd Dagenais into the UCF family for his first match in front of the home crowd.
"It was really exciting to feel the support from the fans," sophomore outside hitter Janine Williams said. "It was nice to see standing room only out there. It was a lot of fun."
Students began lining up outside The Venue at 3:30 p.m., more than two hours prior to game time, as the first 1,000 coeds received a guaranteed seat to the UCF versus USF football game the following weekend. But, the students and other UCF volleyball enthusiasts in the crowd received more than just a ticket to a football game. They were able to witness, and be a part of, history.
"Students were out there as early as 3:30," Dagenais said. "I thought, `Wow, this is going to be big.' We talked about it being big, but you don't want to really hope because you just don't know what is going to happen. Then, I heard numbers that anywhere between 600-1000 people were turned away. I can't think of anything else, but how amazing it is that we had that kind of a turnout. It was not just students. We had families. We had community members. We had high school kids. It was really nice to see that bunch."
The largest crowd for a volleyball match all-time at UCF, the fans were able to experience the new era of UCF volleyball, and they embraced it. U-C-F was chanted from the stands every time the Knights touched the volleyball, and the cheer only grew stronger as the match grew longer.
"I think that it really started to get going in the third game, when I started hearing, U-C-F, every time that we touched the ball," Dagenais said. "I thought wow! They are getting into it. They are enjoying it. Really, regardless of what is happening on the floor if they are having fun, then they are going to come back. That allows us the time to build what we need to build to become really good."
"We set a record in attendance tonight," junior Erin Campbell said. "Having people in attendance shows us that we have a lot of support on campus and in the community. Stanford is a great team, I will not take anything away from them, but going out there tonight showed our fans that this is a fun sport to watch."
Besides making history, the spectators were taken back in history as the Knights' 1978 AIAW national championship team was honored during the match. The ladies of the 55-0 squad, along with head coach Lucy McDaniel, high-fived one another and waved to the immense crowd, with the mob giving the women their utmost respect. The crowd roared for the innovators of the UCF volleyball program following Dagenais heartfelt thank you, with most giving the squad a standing ovation.
"It is important for the players to have a tangible base with the people that came before them," Dagenais said. "When I realized that we have a national championship team I knew that we had to find a way to honor them. What a better night to do it then when we bring in the six-time national champions and arguably one of the best programs in the country. We were going to honor them on that night; that was the time. It is important to our players to that there are people that came before them that paved the road for them. The nice arena and the nice locker room and everything that they have now was really paved by somebody else's efforts. It was nice for them. It is really a nice thing to be able to go back and see where they come from. The smiles on the alumni's faces and on our kids' faces made for a really magical moment."
Not a single person that entered the facility will forget their own magical moments they took from the opening of The Venue at UCF. Whether it was seeing a future Olympian making a heart-stopping kill, seeing the Knights battle against its highest ranked opponent, seeing history in the flesh or even enjoying the weekend's football game for which they earned their ticket, that evening will always be a night to remember.