From a Nebraska farm to a national title game, U of L volleyball coach pushes authenticity

When volleyball coach Dani Busboom Kelly thinks about the University of Louisville’s 2022 season, the national title game isn’t the first thing to come to her mind.

The U of L volleyball team appeared in their first NCAA Division I women’s national title game when they faced off against Texas in December.

The Longhorns swept the Cards, but Busboom Kelly isn't dwelling on where the team has been. She wants to focus on what they can learn from where they've been.

She doesn’t talk about the spotlight, either — although her rising program created big headlines the last few seasons.

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Busboom Kelly’s small-town Nebraska roots keep her humble. Her graduating class was made up of 15 girls and five boys. If you asked, they would tell you she was a better softball player. Who knows where she'd be had she followed that path. Volleyball was her favorite sport, so she followed her joy and not the opinions offered by others.

Now, that path just led the Cardinals to their first back-to-back Final Four appearances in program history.

But for Busboom Kelly, that's not the back-to-back she keeps thinking about.

It’s the 2017 team, whose goal wasn't to make the Final Four.

“One of our goals was to win back-to-back games in the conference,” Busboom Kelly said. “That’s where we started.”

Positions were switched. Sacrifices were made. New plans were laid. They won the whole conference instead.

That was her first year at the helm of the Cards.

“You guys, when we do make (the Final Four), you will have a huge part in that,” Busboom Kelly told that 2017 team.

She says the success of the 2022 season is because of the 2017 season. You can't have one without the other. That is the team’s roots. It's what grew them into a team of national prominence in a state known for putting a ball through a net, not over it.

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A national title at the University of Nebraska in 2006

You don’t coach a national title game without roots of your own.

Busboom Kelly grew up on a farm. That's where she learned about hard work and diligence. While some families' mood hinged on a good or bad year for the farm, her father’s demeanor never changed. The price of corn was out of his control. Some years it was high. Other years, they made little money.

“The consistency piece was modeled to me on a daily basis,” she said.

With such a tight-knit class at school, everyone had seen her at her best and her worst. It’s hard to hide anything in such a small town. That’s where she learned authenticity.

She took those traits to the University of Nebraska, where she won a national title in 2006, but that glosses over the sacrifice she made when, before the start of that season, she moved from setter to libero.

She took that shift and became the best libero in the Big 12 that season with 580 single-season digs, shattering the previous record by 100.

Following her four-year career for the Cornhuskers, she dug into the college ranks, as an assistant at Tennessee, a short stint here in the 'ville and then back to Nebraska, where she coached two All Americans.

By 2017, she returned to Louisville — this time as a head coach.

She took all the things she’d learned and silently applied them to her program. Consistency and authenticity were key. She taught her team to sit at a round table, where no one's voice is the loudest and everyone has a voice.

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“If you came to our practice, you might not know who the head coach is,” Busboom Kelly said. “If you didn’t know anything, you probably won’t be able to tell who the captains are.”

Why? Because their coach was never a No. 1 recruit. She wasn't chosen for job openings. That’s where she learned about not always getting what you want.

That's another part of the foundation: consistency, authenticity, sacrifice, determination. Those are what the last five seasons have been about, and that brought a long line of firsts: first undefeated regular season, first Elite Eight, first Final Four, first national title game, first No. 1 ranking.

But behind the celebrations are some fears:

“I was scared after making it to the Final Four (in 2021),” she said.  “You’re one point away from not making it, and you have to do it the whole season. Like to get a great seed in the tournament, you have to play great the whole season. You need every advantage you can possibly get, so it is insanely hard.”

She was afraid people would see the team’s first Final Four appearance as a fluke.

"Like, 'oh Louisville, well, yeah they made it here once,'" she said.

So, really, what was this season like to make it back?

Busboom Kelly doesn’t think that question is about her. It’s about her players who stepped up big, her transfers who just really love the game, who were willing to, like their coach, switch positions for the betterment of the team.

In 2017, she was the new shiny coach.

Now, she's a new mom who goes to bed a lot earlier.

A lot can change in five years, but some things haven't. The team does not have a special mantra, no secret ingredient in the recipe.

The Cardinals volleyball team bought in to core values and, Busboom Kelly said, "It's showing."

This article originally appeared on Louisville Courier Journal: University of Louisville volleyball coach Busboom Kelly talks teamwork