Coach Barnes Iowa Media Day Transcript

IOWA CITY, Iowa – University of Iowa volleyball head coach Jim Barnes addressed the local media on Thursday morning prior to the start of the 2026 season.

Q: Introducing the Big Ten Tournament this year, what's that mean in terms of something to play for?
COACH BARNES: All for it. I’ve been pushing for it since we got here and so it was good to get all the coaches on board because I think it's a no-brainer on how exciting it'll be and it's another championship to play for.

It mixes up the season a little bit more. We have a lot of nonconference games that we picked up, two or three because of that. So, there's a lot of pluses, but I think at the end of the year, you're going to see a lot of excitement with that Big Ten Tournament and kind of centrally located there in Indiana. It's one of our goals, one of many, to get there and really go as far as we can.

Q: What about the Big Ten-SEC Challenge this year? Playing at Mississippi State, what does that do in terms of helping prepare you with the nonconference schedule that's gotten pretty lengthy as you were just referring to?
COACH: Yeah, just as a coach, I like the motivation of it. Our players are aware and they know it's SEC teams and we're going to represent our conference, too. So, I like that. I like that there's more things to play for, more motivation to play on the road and learn how to play on the road because the Big Ten, there's no harder place to play than on the road in the Big Ten.

So, we'll go to another place that's not quite as hard and play the SEC.

Q: Pretty long road stretch here to start the season. What do you hope to see from your team before you guys come back to Xtream?
COACH: I'm sure we're going to see a lot. We are on the road, we are learning quite a bit on purpose this way and I tell you from April until now, I don't know if I've had a team improve as much as I've seen this group has. They've really surprised us with how much that they've improved. We improved over the spring, but at the end we were really catching on and over the summer, we need to bottle that because we did some great things over the summer.

Q: Having 13 returners this year is pretty strong in this era of college athletics. What does that do in terms of helping keep that improvement going into the season?
COACH: Well, it's the key to why we improved over the summer, because our seniors lead a lot of that. So, they were locked in, obviously, because, like I said, probably the biggest improvement I've seen is our pins. One of our weakest positions going into the spring was our pins on the outside, and now it is our strength, which has really surprised me. We are deeper playing at a consistently high level at the pin, which was our question mark going into the season. It is no longer that, it is our strength, so look forward to seeing how that shows up on game day.

Q: How do you go about replacing Claire this year? Obviously, over 1,000 assists kind of racked those up last year and you’re having to replace her now.
COACH: She was a fun player to coach, just so dynamic and she's still playing. She's playing pro and we’re really proud of Claire. Our setter position right now though is stronger than ever. With Jenna and Nikki who are two really dynamic, athletic players.

And so, we're not missing a beat. In fact, probably our second strongest position is our setting position. Jenna's uncommonly had a lot of experience, because Claire was hurt so much her first year. So, Jenna's played and has good experience, but Jenna's on all cylinders and Nikki's special. She's a freshman who can do all these intangible things you can't coach. She's a gamer. She'll step in a game without any hesitation, so she's a rare freshman. I love that group.

Q: How much does it help, I mean, the circumstances that Jenna got to play were unfortunate, but looking back at it now, how much does it help knowing like she's got game reps and that she's going to help carry a lot of that moving forward?
COACH: She draws on it and you can see it. She's just playing like such a veteran even though it’s really her first time to start, you know, she knows she's a starter going into it. But there are no butterflies, it's all attack. She's on attack mode, so that's what I want to see.

Q: So that the pins are a strength now, you also called yourself ‘Middle Hitter U’ at Big Ten Media Day. So I guess in terms of the offense, what's the split going to be this year between outside and middle?
COACH: Well, Hannah's going to really lead the way that way. She's having the best camp she's ever had. She's really healthy, playing really well, leading, really, I feel like for the first time really leading every day. And I think she'll do some big things in the middle.

It's the other middle that we're going to see how that progresses because we made a couple of different changes. Liv Mogridge, who's come in and played some middle in the spring, we've moved her to the right side because she's just killing it over there. We'll see if we keep her there, because we do need that second middle to continue to step up and we have Peyton and Makena, two sophomores that are competing there. We really need them to get consistent so that we can keep Liv on the right. We can give Liv more balls on the right and, as you'll see, she's got a huge arm. She's consistent and that's what we're hoping to have.

We'll see how that progresses this exhibition. We'll learn more and day by day we'll figure out if that's our biggest deal. But Middle U, we're working there. I'm just so happy we got pins who can really put the ball away. That will help the middles because of that.

Q: What's it like for Liv to come from an athletic background family?
COACH: It’s a joy. We talk sports all the time and her family's that way, but she's an instant leader, instant glue coming into the gym and tough as nails. If I get her to smile every now and again, that'd make me happy, but she is a tough kid and she's healthy. I asked her to switch positions and she was like, "Let's go."

The kind of kid you want and in an instant, she could flip back in the middle and wouldn't hesitate. That's still on the table, but she's a leader. She's driving the way for this team.

Q: You mentioned Hannah helping drive this offense a lot. How have you seen her take a step forward with her leadership and with what she was able to do a little bit last year carrying that over into this?
COACH: She's just way more consistent. She shows up every day, locked in, great attitude. She's always hustled, but it was all the other stuff just bringing that attitude in her voice to the gym and consistency in practices. She's been doing that every day. That usually follows into match times when you see players locked in like that. She's helping the way and I think it helps her having Liv as someone right next to her and some of our other seniors are all stepping up. Rosa Vesty is having a heck of a camp. She's improved probably the most. I'm really proud of Rosa. She's an everyday leader too, but she's got some punch now. She's really gotten stronger and higher. It’s been a joy to watch Rosa step up to another level.

Q: Two years ago, a lot of success in five-setters. Last year, not as much success in five-setters. Is that something you guys are talking about? Do you want to avoid five-setters this year?
COACH: This tends to come up time to time since we played so many last year. We finish a lot of practices with what we call the race to 15. The practice is over, now we're playing a 15-point scrimmage to finish it and learn how to play those a little better. Then how do we avoid as many of those as we can.

When DePaul called about the exhibition, they just called me yesterday and said, "Hey, what about we just play five?" I go, "That'll be fitting. Let's start our first match and play five sets.” We're going five Saturday regardless of the score.

So told the team get ready, we'll get that five-setter out of the way and go after it Saturday.

Q: Two wins away from 500 in your career, is that a number that is just like mind-blowing to you at any point?
COACH: Well, all I know is I want our record to be 2-0 for this team. That’s what I'm more concerned about.

Q: Mo obviously graduated. Where do you feel you are at with that position?
COACH: That's a position that they're battling. Jaimie's really stepped up. She's playing at an all-time high and we hope that's her norm because she's just killing it right now. She's done a real good job. That whole crew is just a workhorse. They're getting after it.

But we need that crew to really anchor that serve receive because defensively we're so good. And that's one of the things we work on every day. If we can continue to get more steady on the serve receive part, we've got the pins to put it away, we've got middles, we've got great setters, we could really play at a high level.

Q: Do you expect this team to be even more competitive when it comes to Big Ten play and to have even more success this year? If so, what would be the reason?
COACH: It will be. There's no hoping. It's going to be better. We're tougher, we're more consistent, we're deeper. Like I told this team, we have multiple game-day players on this roster right now and having had that, we've known the game-day players pretty early. We have a lot of game-day players, so we're deeper.

That alone is going to help us go further. It helps us train better because everybody's really fighting for it. All the elements are there. You have to stay healthy, you have to have things continue to go your way, but this team is going to go deeper.