Texas' Cardinal Rules: What The Team Learned After Outlasting Stanford and Louisville

For two straight matches, Texas volleyball found itself in the thick of high-pressure, five-set battles against top-10 opponents Stanford and Louisville. Both times, the Longhorns walked away with wins in dramatic fashion, and in the process, they learned a lot about who they are and what kind of team they can become.

Pure Resilience

This is the obvious takeaway here, but what do you know about a little bit of that trademark Texas fight? When things got the hardest and the craziest and the team looked to be in the most trouble with their backs against the wall, they played their best. Associate HC Ben Josephson noted that "Things that weren't going well in all phases all of a sudden just got cleaned up once they kind of got onto their deathbed."

“It tells us they’re probably overthinking a lot of what they’re doing,” Josephson explained. “We’re trying to do lots of things that are new and hard. But at some point, it’s like screw it, let’s get a win, and then they have the ability to kick that into gear... As a coach, there's not enough money in the world to buy that experience of coming back 6-11 basically two games in a row."

The players have an insane drive to win without much coach encouragement, and as Assistant Coach Reily Buechler-Canter puts it, there are "A lot of girls on the team that hate to lose," specifically pointing out Ramsey Gary as "by far the most competitive person I think anyone has ever met."

The Importance of Momentum

Momentum has been a consistent talking point for the Longhorns in September, and their last two matches showed why. Both of Texas’ decisive runs began with gritty plays on the defensive end of the court. Those sequences kept the rallies alive, led to transition kills, and flipped the energy in the gym, turning tense points into fuel for extended runs.

Right now, the players are showing just how quickly momentum can swing in volleyball, and how their response dictates whether it sticks. That awareness is even more valuable when Texas has the crowd on its side. Both matches were played in front of Longhorn-heavy audiences, and the roar that followed these plays only magnified their impact. It’s why securing a top-four NCAA tournament seed is so important: it guarantees home-court advantage in Gregory Gym for the regional semi-finals and finals, where burnt orange crowds can transform sparks into unstoppable momentum surges.

How They Get Fired Up

What stands out in crunch time isn’t just who gets the kills or digs, but how the Longhorns manage themselves emotionally. Josephson has been impressed: “Great personalities step up big in moments,” he said. “Everybody’s leading huddles. The communication from the bench players to the starters is doing really good too, encouraging and sharing information.” That shared responsibility has allowed the coaches to focus their words on tactics rather than emotion. Players are able to take the initiative on regulating their mindset, so that the coaches can key in exclusively on the gameplan in those high-stakes huddles. 

Canter echoed the theme that it's not just one or two players who are the emotional leaders of the team, saying “I’ve seen more girls that I was not expecting to step up, step up.” For her, the surprise has been how widespread the fire is, almost everyone has had a moment where they’ve lifted the team. Everyone feeds off of each other, and as Canter puts it, "Everyone gets kind of fiery."