Sept. 26, 2012

Get an inside look at the Stanford women's volleyball team each week. In this edition, freshman Madi Bugg talks about NSO week and starting Pac-12 play.

Hey Stanford fans,

Last week all of the students moved onto campus. The freshmen moved in first for New Student Orientation (NSO) week. On the first night of NSO, the band came to each dorm to collect the new freshmen, jammed out to a song, and then sprinted to the next dorm with the entire freshmen class eventually meeting in the quad. The band leader was covered in blue body paint, the drummers wore tutus and the rest of the band wore whatever crazy clothes they could find. I actually was hit in the head with a trumpet at one point. Other than that, it was a good time.

The rest of the week was full of inspiring speeches, compelling conversations, and getting to know the people in the class. One of my favorite things about Stanford is when I get to ask everyone I meet, "What's your special thing?" because everyone here is incredible and surprising.

Wednesday night we opened conference play with our rival, Cal. We won in three straight sets! Our fans are always great, but with Cal being our rival it really brought out the best in them. The team played really well together and everyone contributed to a great performance to start off our season with a bang!

The next day we left campus to travel to Salt Lake City to play Utah. I lived right outside of Salt Lake City for four years so I was lucky enough to get to chat with some of my family friends that I had not seen for a really long time. They came to the game, which we played in Utah's basketball and gymnastics arena. It was huge! The last time they played in that arena was 1993. Also, I have to give credit to their announcer for really engaging the crowd throughout the entire match. It was a tough game for our team, but thankfully we were able to come out on top in four sets and win the match.

This was a super eventful week for our team with NSO, opening the Pac-12 season and classes starting the following Monday. It was really fun finally meeting my classmates for the next four years, starting conference play, and I cannot wait for whatever next week will bring!

Madi