Volleyball's 25: Missy Aggertt
Friday, August 22, 2008 | Volleyball
By: Sean Cartell
UF Communications
Editor's Note: This is the 18th of a 25-part daily series on GatorZone.com honoring the great players in Florida volleyball history (in no particular rank or order) leading up to the start of the 25th season since Gator volleyball was reinstated as a varsity sport prior to the 1984 campaign.
Early in the tenure of head coach Mary Wise, veteran Heidi Anderson set the standard of excellence at the setter position, leaving many Florida fans to wonder if any player could fill the void left by her graduation.
The Gators found that answer in Missy Aggertt (1992-95), the epitome of a student-athlete, who hailed from Jacksonville, Ill., and, according to the Journal Courier was recruited by approximately 85 Division-I schools as a prep athlete.
Aggertt's high school coach Larry Sample saw something special in Aggertt and began getting her name on the recruiting radar from a very early age.
“I started sending out tapes to colleges when Missy was in eighth grade,” Sample told the Journal Courier. “I knew she would be a blue-chipper and an outstanding player. She worked very hard to become an outstanding player. A lot of coaches saw her in different summer camps and the letters just kept coming in.
Despite living in the heart of a Big 10 volleyball hotbed, Aggertt liked what she heard when she visited with Wise and decided to head south to Gainesville to become part of a Florida program on the rise.
“It was a very good visit,” Aggertt told the Journal Courier. “Coach Wise started to look at me when I was a junior and she wrote all the time and sent articles about how the team was doing. Ohio State and Wisconsin are great programs. I finally decided on Florida because of my visit and Coach Wise. It is a long way from home, but I think things will work out.”
Aggertt, 5-foot-9, was named to the Volleyball Monthly Fab-50 team and was a four-time member of the Champaign News-Gazette All-State team. Her high school team won the 1988 Illinois High School Class AA Championship and reached the Sweet Sixteen of the state tournament in 1989, 1990 and 1991. She set her school records for career kills (903), career hitting percentage (.388), career assists (1,075), career blocks (281), single-season kills (274) and season hitting percentage (.486).
At the end of her senior season, Aggertt had her jersey (#19) retired before her last home regular-season match.
“I didn't have any idea at the time,” Aggertt told the Journal Courier. “It was the same number that my sister Jennifer wore. That makes it even more special. It is certainly one of my biggest thrills in volleyball along with winning the state tournament as a freshman. It is not something I will forget. It is something you will appreciate when you get older.”
Aggertt graduated from a 4.5 grade point average (based on a 4.0 scale), was a member of the National Honor Society and earned numerous scholar-athlete awards during her prep career.
She set foot on the Florida campus in the fall of 1992 as the understudy to Anderson, then a senior. The opportunity to learn from the best setter who had been through the Gator program at the time was invaluable to Aggertt.
“For me, one of the best ways to learn is to watch,” Aggertt told Michelle Thresher of the Florida Alligator in a Nov. 17, 1992 article. “During the recruiting process, you know you can go to a school where you're probably going to start. Here, they kind of laid it out for me – your freshman year is for learning.
“At the level Florida is at right now, it's worked out for the best. If Heidi hadn't been here, I think there would have been a lot of pressure.”
Aggertt knew that her first fall in Gainesville would be an important time to learn the collegiate game, as she would soon be charged with the responsibility of directing the Gators' offense.
“We didn't expect her to be at Heidi's level when she came in,” Wise told the Alligator. “But starting in the spring, she's calling the shots. It's her show.”
Aggertt saw action in 33 of 36 matches during her rookie campaign and she demonstrated her ability to balance both the academic and athletic responsibilities, earning a 4.0 grade point average during her first semester. That season, the Gators advanced to the first NCAA Final Four in school history.
Aggertt welcomed her starting role as a sophomore and displayed the type of play that Wise was hoping for from her starting setter.
“What we're seeing from Missy now is what we saw from her in high school,” Wise told Paul Jenkins of the Gainesville Sun in an Oct. 16, 1993 article. “She worked through some tough times in the early going and now she's getting better with each match and she's having fun out there. She's like a quarterback who is now seeing the whole field and making good decisions.”
Initially, Aggertt was somewhat uncomfortable knowing that she had to live up to Anderson's play in Wise's first two seasons. But in an article in the Gainesville Sun, Aggertt credited her teammates for making it a seamless transition.
“I really have to thank the team for helping me out the first month of the season,” Aggertt said. “They know I'm not Heidi and they have helped me come into my own as a player. The more we play together, the more comfortable we feel together.”
Wise agreed, saying that Aggertt's all-around game had greatly improved since the start of the sophomore season.
“You can tell how far she has come from the fact that her serving, blocking and defense have all gotten better,” Wise said. “Those were things she couldn't concentrate on until she was comfortable setting. Now she is in a groove setting and she is able to do those other things which free up our hitters.”
Aggertt was the starting setter for every match that 1993 season and was named a GTE/CoSIDA Academic All-America third-team selection and was named to the NCAA South Region All-Tournament team.
Aggertt charted 1,527 assists that season – second on the school's single-season assists list – and tallied 50-plus assists on 11 occasions. She ranked among the top 20 assists leaders in the NCAA all season long, finishing at the year at No. 1u7 with 12.38 assists per game.
Aggertt compiled a 4.0 record in the fall, spring and summer semesters and was one of four UF players to post triple-digit digs in 1993.
Aggertt wasn't alone in 1993 as Anderson served as a volunteer assistant coach for the Gators and was a helpful mentor to her predecessor.
“Lots of times, Heidi's just standing on the side and I can just quietly hear her say 'That one's too high. That one's too tight,'” Aggertt told Alligator writer Dana Heiss. “And it's like she's just watching me sometimes. It gives me a chance to have constant feedback, and it really helps me out a lot.”
Entering her junior season, Aggertt ranked third on the school's all-time assists list but still was not garnering a lot of media attention or notoriety. But that was okay with Aggertt, who focused her efforts on working hard to help her team succeed.
“She's not the player nor the type of person to always get the spotlight,” Wise told Brian Adair in a Sept. 29, 1994 article in the Florida Alligator. “She's just one of those blue-collar type hard workers who has gotten this far based on her work ethic.”
The 1994 season didn't prove to be an easy one for the Gator volleyball team, which saw season-ending knee injuries to All-America co-captain Aycan Gokberk and sophomore Claire Roach. Aggertt became the leader of a young and inexperienced Gator squad but, according to her teammates, she easily filled that role.
“As the season goes on, she just gets better and better about making setting choices,” Teammate Ashley Mullis told the Alligator. “And as a captain, she provides a lot of leadership with her consistent attitude. No matter if we're losing or we're winning, she maintains the same attitude. She keeps everyone on a good level.”
Wise credited Aggertt's consistency and her character as the keys to her success.
“She's not a flashy setter, not the real dynamic-type setter that we've played against,” Wise said. “She's just a stable, consistent setter and, ideally, that's what this team needs. She's extremely bright and she's got a real good personality, the character for a setter. You would want the same type of person quarterbacking the football team or as the point guard on your basketball team – you want them to be able to run the show.”
That season, Aggertt was named to the All-SEC first team and was a member of the AVCA All-South Region first team. She also was voted to the GTE/CoSIDA Academic All-America first team.
Aggertt, in 1994, ranked first in the SEC and 12th in the nation in assists with 13.05 dishes per game. She also ranked fourth on the team in digs with 238 scoops. Aggertt moved up to No. 2 on the school's all-time career assists list with 3,215 dishes and set Florida's record for assists in a match with 81 vs. Arkansas. She also served as the student representative on the University Athletic Association Board of Directors.
That summer, Aggertt was one of three Florida players who were selected to participate in the 1994 United States Olympic Festival, playing on the North team. Aggertt was the team's starting setter and helped her squad to the gold medal.
Entering her senior season, Aggertt's role on the team was clear. She and her four fellow seniors were prominently featured on the cover of the team's 1995 media guide. She would be the team's leader, but she also would have the responsibility of training junior setter Nikki Shade, who would take over the reigns in 1996.
“We will use Missy Aggertt and Nikki Shade like we used Heidi Anderson and Missy in 1992,” Wise said in the outlook section of the team's 1995 media guide. “Right now, Missy is our starting setter, but we will be working Nikki in. Both of them understand that. Missy is the more experienced setter, but Nikki will be given the controls come January.”
Aggertt finished her Florida career second on the school's all-time assists list with 4,464. She was named to the All-SEC first-team for the second consecutive season in 1995 and was again named to the GTE/CoSIDA Academic All-America first team. Aggertt averaged 12.72 assists per game as a senior, which ranked third in the SEC. She also was third on the team and eighth in the league in aces per game (0.31/gm).
“When I signed here, I saw this program as becoming one of the top programs, but I thought it might take a couple of years,” Aggertt said in a Sept. 1, 1994 article in Gator Bait. “I had no doubt that Florida was going to reach the top, but I didn't realize it would be so quickly. It was definitely a pleasant surprise.”
| From the Vault |
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| Missy Aggertt's 1992 Player Personality Profile Questionnaire |
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| Superstitions: Wearing the same headband all season. |
| My craziest ambition: White-water rafting in the lakes of Colorado. |
| My worst fear: Mary Wise taking a new job. |
| When I'm 35, I want to be: A mother and a career woman. |
| The best advice I've been given is: It's amazing how much can be accomplished when no one cares who gets the credit. |
| My favorite place on campus: My room. |
| When I'm finished playing volleyball, I'd like to: Be a successful newscaster. |
| When friends back home ask me about Florida, I tell them: I love it. |
| The greatest thing about being an athlete is: No standing in registration lines. |
| When I was growing up, I never thought I would: Go so far away to school. |
| If I could tell everyone in the world something about the University of Florida, I would say: That after wondering for a whole summer, it feels great to know that I made the right decision when I decided to go here. |
END OF REPORT
