Florida Gators

GAINESVILLE, Fla. — The 100th, 500th and even the 1,000th, they're just numbers, according to Mary Wise. And she's exactly right. 

"They really just represent the passing of time, as well as the number of really talented players that have come through this program," Florida's spectacular volleyball coach said. "Would a round number be any more meaningful than, say, a championship match or a coming-out moment from a player?" 

 

No, and Wise should know. She's experienced a plethora of milestone wins, moments and coming-outs in her 28 seasons on the Gators' sidelines, with the most recent coming Sunday — 11th-ranked Florida's 3-1 defeat of Arkansas — that marked the 1,000th win in UF volleyball history. 

It was the 844th of Wise's tenure with the Gators, which means she's responsible for 84.4 percent of that grand achievement (pun intended). 

But let's give Ann Marie Rogers an assist, as well. 

Rogers was the women's athletic director at UF when the Gators went looking for the program's second volleyball coach to succeed Marilyn McReavy, who made just one NCAA Tournament from the program's inception in 1984 to her final season in 1990. Rogers did her homework and unearthed a gem in luring Wise from her assistant's post at Kentucky.

"I guess my instincts were pretty good," said Rogers, who retired in 2003. "I often say my claim to fame was hiring Mary Wise." 

Florida actually was Wise's second head coaching job. As a standout setter and two-time Big Ten Conference champion at Purdue, Wise bucked the system when she was hired right after graduating as head coach Iowa State and became the youngest volleyball coach in Division I history. She went 81-63 in four seasons with the Cyclones before leaving in the summer of 1985 to join her future husband, Mark, who became head men's basketball coach at Lindsay Wilson College in Columbia, Ky. One year later, she was hired as an assistant coach at Kentucky. 

Five years later, Rogers and the Gators came calling. 

"She went out on a limb to hire me," Wise said. "And she championed the sport of volleyball."

And now, 27 years later? 

"It gives me chills," Rogers said of the UF volleyball evolution and game days at O'Dome. "I'm so proud of Mary and what she has accomplished, not just with the volleyball on the court, but how her athletes have done to become role models in the community." 

Under Wise, the Gators' first win was a 3-1 defeat of Toledo on Aug. 30, 1991 in the South Florida Invitational at Tampa. 

"I definitely remember that one," Wise said. 

As for the rest of her victories, they're not all embedded in Wise's memory. Certainly not as much the 23 Southeastern Conference titles, eight Final Fours, dozens of All-Americans, and relationships with her players that will last a lifetime.

Along the way, volleyball has become the No. 1 participation sport for girls, surpassing softball and basketball. 

"None of us back in 1987 could have foreseen the growth. We were considered a niche sport," Wise said. "The rise to the level of interest and media attention was done on the backs of no one. It's been a slow growth and a lot of people did a lot of work before us and and we've have benefited from the ground-breaking they did."

From ground-breaking to ceiling smashing. 

One thousand times over. 

So to commemorate No. 1,000, here's a trip down Florida's Volleyball Milestone Memory Lane on the way to No. 1000. 

                   1 
               100
                 200
               300
                 400
               500
              600

                 700

                 800

                 900

                 1,000