After starting the season 9-0, the Wisconsin volleyball team will look to continue its perfect streak as the team faces Northern Illinois tonight. Although the game stands seemingly as just another contest on the schedule, when the team rolls into DeKalb, Ill., Tuesday, the night will mean a bit more for head coach Pete Waite.
Waite began his head coaching career at NIU and spent 11 seasons with the Huskies, becoming the school's all-time winningest coach before coming to Wisconsin. As head coach at NIU, Waite went 266-102, claiming eight regular season conference titles, six conference tournament titles and made four NCAA tournament appearances.
Tuesday will be Waite's first return to DeKalb to compete against the Huskies since leaving NIU in 1998.
""To a certain extent, I didn't want to go back right away, especially when my own players were there, so we waited a while,"" Waite said.
Even as Waite's seasons at Wisconsin passed, scheduling conflicts always prevented the two teams from facing each other. This season though, both squads were available for a mid-week match, and Waite took the opportunity to return to his old school.
""Going back there now, it's obviously 12 years later and it's a much different team we have here on the court,"" Waite said. ""When you think about even how old our current players were when I left that program, it's very different.""
In fact, Waite's old stomping grounds, the Chick Evans Field House, is no longer even the home of NIU's volleyball program. Since 2002, the team has played at the new Convocation Center on a smaller court which seats just under 800 spectators.
Waite hopes students and other Badger fans will make the two-hour trip down to DeKalb Tuesday to fill the limited-capacity venue with Wisconsin cheers. And while most of them will likely be unaware of the circumstances, they will all be witnesses to a homecoming of sorts for Waite.
In a literal sense however, Waite's true homecoming was when the former Big Ten coach of the year left NIU for Wisconsin. Waite is a Madison native and grew up in the city, attending Monona Grove High School. The collegiate volleyball standout always kept close ties to UW-Madison, even at a young age.
""For me personally, I came to Wisconsin basketball camps growing up. So through eighth grade, I had been on the Field House floor,"" Waite said. ""So coming here was great and growing up here everything was just bigger than life as far as the athletic department.""
Now, Waite has become one of the most successful coaches in that same department's history and has the best seat in the house for every Badger home volleyball game. So far this season, the coach has seen plenty of wins from that position at the edge of the court.
Waite's Badgers will certainly have to work hard to earn their coach a win in his return to NIU. The Huskies enter tomorrow night with an equally unblemished 11-0 record, losing just four sets this entire season.
