By Jeff White (jwhite@virginia.edu)
VirginiaSports.com
CHARLOTTESVILLE — The boisterous crowd that packed Memorial Gymnasium on Nov. 11 gave the University of Virginia volleyball team a decided home-court advantage, and it’s a scene head coach Shannon Wells hopes to see become a regular occurrence in years to come.
In front of 1,108 fans—the most ever for a volleyball match at Mem Gym—UVA defeated Virginia Tech 3-0. That gave the Cavaliers, who won 3-2 in Blacksburg on Oct. 28, a season sweep of the Hokies.
“Even when we’re not winning, we get a lot of compliments on how fun it is to come and watch a match at Mem,” Wells said. “This is a really tough place to play. That match, our fans were awesome, and they made it really hard for Virginia Tech to play here. That’s our plan: to continue to build that and make that more of what it looks like when you come to Mem.”
Two days after that Nov. 11 match, tragedy rocked the University community. Three UVA students—football players Devin Chandler, Lavel Davis Jr. and D’Sean Perry—were shot and killed on Grounds after returning from a class field trip to Washington, D.C.
“What happened was so drastic and unexpected and heartbreaking,” Wells said.
With only three matches remaining, the volleyball team considered canceling the rest of its season, but “our seniors wanted to play,” Wells said, “and we wanted to grant them the opportunity to do that. And they felt like it was an opportunity for them to honor their friends, to be honest. [Chandler, Davis and Perry] were their friends. So we did it.”
In its final home match, Virginia fell to Wake Forest on Nov. 20. The Cavaliers, missing three of their rotation players, closed the season with losses at NC State and North Carolina.
“We got through the last few weeks,” Wells said, but the Wahoos were unable to build on their sweep of the Hokies.
“The last few weeks were hard in so many ways,” she said. “We just felt like we were building so much momentum to end in the right direction, and then it was out of our control to do that.”
Even so, the Hoos made clear progress in their second season under Wells. Hired in in late April 2020 after an unexpected coaching change at UVA, she was charged with rebuilding a program that had suffered through five consecutive losing seasons and has made only two NCAA tournament appearances, in 1998 and ’99.
In 2021, the Cavaliers finished 8-20 overall and 1-17 in ACC play, but…