1-on-1 with DP – 93.7 The Ticket KNTK - Kayla Caffey enters the transfer portal last night: July 29th, 10am

Episode Date: July 29, 2022

This leaves Nebraska Volleyball with 3 middle blockersAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

It's time to go one-on-one with D.P. Coming at you live from the couple Chevrolet GMC Studios. Here is your host, Derek Pearson. Brought you by Mary Ellen's Food for the Soul. On 93-7 The Ticket and the Ticketfm.com. Welcome in to one-on-one with D.P. Although D.P is not here. DP is down in Texas at the official way-ins for UFC.

Oh, hold on. The number escapes. UFC 277. Down in Texas. Derek Pearson at the official way-ins. He's sending me some videos. He's posting some videos on his Twitter. Derek Lewis makes the wait.

He's ready to go. Let's see. Who else does he have? Drew Dober, Nebraska's own. Drew Dober weighs in at 155.5. He's ready for tomorrow night. And Amanda Nunez makes weight as well at UFC 277.

If you're interested in watching that, you can catch that. Maybe you catch a glimpse of DP in the crowd. I don't know. I don't know how the camera, if he'll get caught on camera, but he'll be there. He'll be giving us some insight into that. Maybe he calls in. I don't know when the way-ins are done,

but maybe he'll call in and give us his official. Well, he won't give predictions. He doesn't give predictions. But he'll give us his thoughts on way-ins and who he's excited to see and what he might be excited to see down at UFC 277. out in Texas. But this is one-on-one with DP sponsored by Mary Ellen's. Thank you, Charles, and all the wonderful people at Mary Ellen's for sponsoring this portion of radio and for just supplying

amazing food for the people of Lincoln. If you haven't yet, get on down to South Lincoln and head over to Mary Ellen and get yourself some delicious food, some fried catfish and fried chicken. They've got wings, they've got collar greens, they've got delicious, delicious, delicious, delicious, delicious food everywhere. The ribs are fantastic. I'm making myself so hungry right now. I might have to stop by today. I might do it.

I might do it. I might drive out there and get me some lunch from Mary Ellen's today because I just made myself extremely hungry. Join in on the conversations today. Nick will be joining me shortly. He's running a little bit late. I know. Surprise after what happened yesterday.

Don't worry. He didn't fall asleep. He's just busy doing other things. But he'll be joining me here shortly. So join in. 402-464-568-5, Honda-Lincoln Hotline, Sarder-Haman text line, and the Sarder-Hameman Juulers-Life video stream, Facebook, YouTube, Twitch, and Twitter. We're here all day for you, giving you sports information, regular information,

things about our daily lives. I know you probably don't want to hear about that. You come here for the sports, but guess what? I got the microphone. I'm going to tell you how my day was. I mean, it's only 10.07, so my day's been pretty good. but that's irrelevant because right now what I want to get into is I don't would you consider it the biggest news I would consider it the biggest news of the day yesterday came late last night

Nebraska volleyball down to three middle blockers as seventh year player Kayla Kaffey enters the transfer portal the transfer from Missouri played for the Huskers for two years, was granted a seventh year by the NCAA. She had a red shirt. She had, I believe she had an injury in there. I believe when she was at Missouri. Then she had the COVID year. Just everything kind of fell together.

The NCAA granted her a seventh year. However, the green light was not turned on by the university to allow her back or to bring her back. just a lot of question marks going on with that. Michaela Kaffey enters the transfer portal 10 days before camp opens for many volleyball programs across the country. She has multiple options. She has options to play professionally. She has options to, I believe she already has her master's to just go into the education

field. She was substitute teaching in Lincoln last. season last year during the season and after but she has she has multiple options she can transfer to another university she has that seventh year she can play she would be a fantastic addition to whoever she goes to but that leaves Nebraska with three middle blockers they have the transfer from penn state the grad transfer from penn state Caitlin hoard and then two freshmen one who enrolled early in becca aleck and then Maggie Mendelsohn who is playing two sports here at the University of Nebraska will be on the volleyball team and also playing on the women's basketball team.

So you're down from, you know, possibly two seniors and two freshmen, you know, having your two seniors kind of lead the way and teach the freshman the ropes to, well, one senior who has been here for a while and one senior who is transferring in from, you know, another powerhouse volleyball program to a, senior transfer in her first year at the University of Nebraska and two freshmen, one going into her first year and one another going into her first full year at the University of Nebraska. As Becca Alec joined the team, she was an early enrol league, joined the team in January, so she got about part of this season. She got about a postseason in a couple, you know, the end of the regular season than the postseason for Nebraska volleyball. It's going to be very interesting. I'm not, I wouldn't be worried if I was, I was anybody because if anybody has shown the ability to, you know, keep a program afloat with

whatever talent is available, it is John Cook. So going into this season with, again, a graduate transfer senior, and two freshmen in your middle, is not concerning. It's a little strange. That's all I would say. I'm not, I mean, last year, many people were worried at the beginning of the season. This probably didn't look very much like a John Cook team because, you know, you had all of these freshmen playing, and they were kind of struggling early on. And by struggling, I mean, they weren't sweeping everybody.

They were still winning their fair share of games until they, they hit that rough stretch where they played three top 10 teams in a row. And again, they were playing multiple freshmen and they were without their other leader on the floor, Lauren Stiverins, as she was getting back from an injury. But as the season went on, as the freshman got more acclimated, you saw that John Cook and this coaching stuff put together a fantastic roster as Nick Sainert joins me in the studio right now. Hello, Nicholas. How are you?

What's up, Briko? How's it going? I'm doing all right. Just talking about Kayla Kaffey transferring away from the Nebraska volleyball team. Yeah, a little, I don't know if I would say shocking. It was kind of interesting how it was so quiet as of late, right? I mean, we're approaching. We always talk about coming up on the football season quickly, but, I mean, the volleyball season's coming up just as fast as well.

And Nebraska is, I mean, as usual, right, they're the Alabama of volleyball. And it's, it's always... Alabama is the Nebraska football. Thank you. There you go. No, we get that right. So anyway, I mean, they're always just reloading rather than rebuilding. And you hit it on the head where Nebraska, they struggled last year, but now it's like they return everybody.

And it was huge last year because they got a player or players like Lawrence Diverins and Lexi Sun back, thanks to the COVID year. But what was so big about it, last season at least, was that, Lexi's son and Lauren Steverns were okay with taking a step back. And that's what something when you look at this Husker volleyball program makes it so valuable and so fascinating, I think, is because the older players understand that at some point, they have to keep moving the program along. They have to keep acclimating newer people, newer players to this program and the standards that are held within it.

And is that a situation with Kayla Kaffee? I don't know. I mean, you have Maggie Mendelsohn coming in as well. And Caitlin Horde, the Penn State transfer. And Becca Alec. Becca Alec as well. Those are your three middles. And it's, yeah, so it's like, you know, where does Kayla Kaffey fit into that?

Do you really want to hold back Maggie Mendelssohn, Becca Alec, or, I mean, Caitlin Horn was an All-American at Penn State, so you don't really want to hold her back. But you have these highly-touted recruits coming in, and do you really want to, I I want to say halt their progression, but maybe slow down their progression. I don't know if you were going to slow it down because it's kind of a known thing. Like if you come into play for Nebraska for John Cook and volleyball, like it's kind of like the Alabama thing where you're going to have to sit. Like if there's going to be somebody in front of you unless you excel at your position and you're, you know, all that you're cracked up to be, you're going to have to sit. You're going to have to take your lumps.

And my only issue with this is that Kayla Kaffey is your most experienced. middle playing for Nebraska. Again, Caitlin Horde played for Penn State. They were both, they probably have the same amount if not Kayla has a little bit more experience than Caitlin Horde in the middle. But having those two to mentor

a Becca Alec and a Maggie Mendelsohn would have been fantastic. And I'm not saying that Caitlin can't do it on her own and John Cook and this coaching staff can't do that on their own. But having another senior in the middle to help them, you know, learn as they go and, you know, teach them the ropes. I mean, as you said, Lexi's son took a step back, but she was still engaged on the sideline. You would see some of their outside hitters after they would get

swapped out in a rotation, go to the sideline. And Lexi's son, one of the first people to greet them and is talking to them. And, you know, I don't know what they're saying, but it looks like she's trying to coach them up on the sides there, you know, letting them know, this is what you've got to do. This is what you've got to look for. So having, you know, another All-American and Kayla Kaffey there, even if she doesn't play much, but, I mean, she was an All-American. You know, having her on that sideline or in the middle helping everybody, you know, get through everything that they need to get through would have been, you know, invaluable. And I'm not saying that Caitlin can't do that and the coaching staff can't do that, but having another body there would have been very helpful. And somebody asked on the text line if there was a scholarship crunch from everything that I've been reading, no.

There wasn't a scholarship crunch. It's just I don't know exactly what was going on why the university didn't greenlight her ability to come back. Well, and maybe, I mean, obviously you say, yeah, the university might not have given her the green light. John Cook did say on his daughter's podcast a couple months ago that after the NCAA green lit, Kayla Kaffee, it was like a couple weeks. He does the podcast with her weekly. A couple weeks after that, John Cook did say on the podcast that the ball was in Kayla's court. Yeah, so I don't know what that means. So, I mean, okay, so I'll tell you this.

We were at Tanner's a couple months ago, gee was a couple months ago. And it was a couple of weeks after Kayla got her seventh year granted. And we actually had a conversation of her future, kind of. And she is extremely excited for teaching. And yes, she entered the transfer portal, so it looks like she wants to play volleyball for another year, whether that's at Nebraska, or whether that's somebody, well, now it's whether it's at somewhere else,

is left to be determined. But she's also played six years. of college volleyball. Like, it's a lot. Maybe, maybe it's just time to hang it up. And like I said earlier,

she has been substitute teaching. Exactly. Like this, this move into the transfer portal could be just like, hey, listen, it's, it's late in the process, late in the summer,

and maybe we'll just set out throughout some feelers to see how this thing plays out. You know, if a Texas comes calling. Like, and it's interesting. 10 days until a camp starts. Exactly.

And that's my point is like, there's a chance where nobody is able to take her because a lot of rosters are filled. And so this move into the transfer portal as I was kind of thinking about it last night, because the news came out pretty late. And I was thinking about it last night, like 10 p.m. Yeah, exactly. I got, I saw the email. I was like, whoa, this is, this is late for a Nebraska news dump. But, um, I like, I truly feel like maybe this is just a chance for her to kind of throw out a feeler to see if any teams are interested. Because it is so late in the process. And she also has played six years of college volleyball, both at Missouri

and now at Nebraska. So there's that angle that you can look at it. Also, on the flip side, she's extremely valuable for what we mentioned, because she has played six years of college volleyball and kind of the whole mentoring part like you just mentioned. She was an All-American last year. She averaged 1.11 blocks, 2.41 kills, and hit 363, led the team in hitting percentage and was second in blocks and kills per set. If you have a spot open, I don't see how you don't go after her. Well, it's one of those things where it's like you're a scholarship. If you're full on scholarships, then it's like, you know, if you're a Texas or a Penn State,

or, I mean, Kentucky, Louisville. If you're Penn State, you lost the middle. Any of those, yeah, true. Any of those powerhouse programs, I mean, if you sit here and your scholarships are full, how do you say, all right, yeah, we're going to take this player over this other player that we brought in? I mean, like, obviously there's going to be situations and it's a cutthroat business. and I use business as an actual word because it is a business. And, I mean, it's cut throat.

So do we think that we see Kayla Kaffey go somewhere? I wouldn't be surprised, but I also wouldn't be surprised if we're sitting here midway through the season going, well, Kayla Kaffey's not playing, and you know that she's just teaching because I know, I know that she is excited about that. She has been excited about that. And I think that's been a big reason why she's gone maybe back and forth on. this decision is because, listen, like, do you really want to do another year of school? Like, do you really want to figure out... She does.

Yeah, so it's like, do you already want to figure out a way to work substitute teaching around a volleyball schedule for Division I volleyball? Like, do you... It's a lot. And give credit to all the athletes number one, but obviously to Kayla Kaffee for doing it for six years working through the transfer to Nebraska as well and becoming a dominant part of this roster. But I also feel like sometimes

it's just time to move on. And like I said, this transfer portal rather than just saying, yeah, I'm going to retire from volleyball just to send a feeler out there. A national, I mean, because if you're Kayla Kaffey and a national contender comes in, comes calling, how do you say no? Yeah, that's kind of what I was taking from it is.

Like of Stanford. She might, maybe she is done with volleyball, but she just wants to see, you know, is there a chance that I could get one more year somewhere else. If so, maybe she'll take it. Exactly. But at the same time, it's so close to camp starting. It would be hard for a university to bring her in, get her ready for classes, get her acclimated, get her set, get her through practices, and all that, and be ready for the start of the season. And I'm sure she could do it. She's, she's, like we said, she's done it for six years.

And it's not like she's not in shape. She's probably been working. She's definitely been working with this team during the soft season. So she's, she's probably ready to go. It's just getting, you know, acclimated to a new team and new coaches and a new setting, new surrounding. Eric Texan, he says, I went to a few games last year. Kayla was a freaking rock star out there. This is a tough loss anyway you spin it. And I'm not saying, I'm not saying it's not a tough loss. It is a tough loss.

I'm just saying that, you know, if anybody can rebound from this, it's John Cook in this volleyball program, especially, I mean, you brought in another All-American middle in Caitlin Horde from Penn State. So you're losing an All-American, but you brought in an All-American. You've got two all-star freshmen who are on your roster. One of them, you know, playing another sport. I'm still interested in how Maggie Meadows. You know, balances the volleyball, basketball thing, especially since, you know, the first quarter of basketball season is the last half of volleyball season.

So I'm interested how she gets through those practices. and, you know, if she plays in, or if she's got a red shirt in both, or redshirt in one, or however that works. But it's going to be really interesting. And, no, she, Kaylee Caffey was very important to Nebraska last season. Losing her is a big blow. But I believe that this volleyball program, this volleyball team, will be able to withstand this. So Dusty and Claytonia John have a similar point on the text line, 402, 464, 5, 685.

They both say something along the lines of Nebraska was a national. contender. It would be hard to say no to Nebraska. And, I mean, let's just play out a scenario here. Kennedy Orr's interesting because she was the number one player coming out of Minnesota in high school and then at set her own recruit. Yeah, number one overall recruit. And she came to Nebraska and had to, like, sat behind Nicklin Hames. And now Nicklin Hamer's returns. We'll probably play some back row a little bit. Our defensive specialist, we'll see where she switched to to get Kennedy Orr into this

program and kind of evolving a little bit. However, so like, excuse me, for for Kayla Kaffey, and you look at that middle blocker, we talked about Becca Alec, we talked about Caitlin Horton, we talked about Maggie Mendelsohn. Like, once again, if Kayla Kaffey wants to substitute teacher, wants to get a teaching job, something along those lines to where she can use her degree, does she really want, like, we talk about roles, I guess, and not saying that Kayla Kaffee wouldn't want to be a mentor, but if she's ready to begin her career off the floor, would she really want to come back to Nebraska and be a mentor and have to wait another year to start her career off the floor, if that makes sense? Like, not saying that she would, she's not that type of person because the conversations that she's been, she's had with us at the ticket, like, she's, she's a fantastic person.

So I don't want to, I don't want to get that, that wrong idea into, into listeners' minds. But in the thought of, all right, maybe I pass on Nebraska, but if Stanford comes calling and I'm going to be able to actually get some deep. decent playing time or a bigger role at Stanford, which is a national contender or, you know, you can put in any school there, maybe that offer is more intriguing and she'd be more willing to put that career off the floor on hold for another season. I mean, maybe she got a job offer to teach somewhere else. Maybe she got, you know, some type of, not offer like a potential offer to be a teacher next year somewhere else.

Exactly. She's thinking maybe I can get a jump on it. I can go to whatever state, whatever city this is, play one more season of volleyball with the local college, the local university, and, you know, be around, be like a substitute for, you know, whatever school she might be going to. And again, this is not, this is not something that I've heard. This is just me guessing at some things that could be possible. I mean, that that's also another possibility is that she has an opportunity for a job in a different state, and there's a university there that she could exhaust her final year of eligibility at while getting,

acclimated to whatever city and state she's going to be living in. I mean, that's a possibility. Talking this late in the process, that's where it kind of puts a twist into things. But I, maybe, obviously, Callie Schwarzenbach followed a former Husker coach, Tyler Hildebrand to Long Beach State. Maybe we see something similar here to where it's, I mean, Callie Schwartz Box is obviously a middle blocker as well. So, I mean, you have that competition factor.

but if she wants to go somewhere maybe where it's a bigger, bigger city, bigger opportunities, maybe it's going to be a lower level school, like a Long Beach state. But she'll be familiar with some people in that room. So maybe it wouldn't make the transition so late in the process, so late in the summer, as difficult because she would know at least two of the people in that room in Tyler Hilderbrand and Kelly Schwarzenbach. This is all just guesstimists. We have no idea what's truly, you know, going on inside of her. Oh, speculation, big time.

Only she knows and we'll find out when she lets us know. But Kayla Kaffey transferring from the Nebraska volleyball program, leaving them with three middle blockers in grad transfer, Caitlin Horde, and two freshmen in Becca Alec and Maggie Mendelsohn. That's going to do that for the first segment of one-on-one. Up next, I have a feeling I know what we're going to talk about, but we'll see where the wind takes us. Up next on 101 on 93-7 the ticket.