When LSU coach Fran Flory walked into the University Laboratory School gym to watch her daughter, Lindsay, play for the final time as a senior for the volleyball team last year, she said she never imagined coaching her as a collegiate athlete.
Fran took the head coach position at LSU in 1998, when Lindsay was almost two years old.
Lindsay grew to love the sport her mother coached, and showed the same prowess on the court Fran did. But Lindsay said she and her mother decided early on that the only way the two would ever meet on a collegiate court would be on opposing teams.
On April 22, 2015, the volleyball team announced Lindsay’s addition to the program.
“I have to say I am as surprised as anybody else that Lindsay is here,” Fran said. “I’m certainly very happy she’s here, but I never wanted her to think that she should come here just because I wanted her to come here because she really loved and had a true passion for LSU.”
Fran said if Lindsay wasn’t her daughter, she still would have recruited her to join the program. Instead, LSU volleyball associate head coach Jill Wilson managed Lindsay’s recruitment while Fran tried to get Lindsay to look at other schools.
“I knew when she came back from those visits that she just wasn’t passionate and excited about it,” Fran said.
Despite telling people otherwise, Lindsay said she knew LSU is where she would end up — not because her mother is the coach, but because it’s where she felt she belonged.
“I knew in the back of my mind I wanted to go to LSU,” Lindsay said. “I went on a visit to another school, and I compared everything there to LSU. My mom always tells people, the school you compare everything to when you go to your visits is probably the school you should be at.”
Before Fran officially approved Lindsay’s spot, she had a sit down with all the senior players.
“I said, ‘Can you handle this? Can our team handle this?’” Fran said. “Cati Leak, Katie Lindelow, Emily Ehrle, Khourtni Fears and Haley Smith [and] I called and said, ‘Can we do this is?’”
The upperclassmen agreed Lindsay was already a part of the LSU volleyball family, and they were overjoyed to have her join the team.
On Aug. 28, Lindsay stepped onto the court to play her first collegiate match in an LSU uniform in the Gregory Gymnasium in Austin, Texas — the same court where her mother played her college career and helped the University of Texas win the AIAW National Championship in 1981.
Fran said she was proud to see her daughter play in a college match, but was more focused on coaching and thought Lindsay stepped up to the challenge, playing well in her first career game.
“My staff was like, ‘we need Lindsay, we need Lindsay,’” Fran said. “I didn’t want it to be anything other than what our team needed at the moment, and I thought she came in and showed poise and great composure. Sure, there was a part of me that was proud of her, but at that point at the match, I wanted to win the match.”
Lindsay’s collegiate start marks the extension of the Flory legacy, which Fran highlights as the winningest coach in program history, leading the team to eight NCAA Tournament berths in the last 10 seasons.
“Volleyball doesn’t define our family, but it’s a huge part of our family,” Fran said. “My husband and I met through volleyball. It’s part of every day of our life. It’s very interesting that she ended up here and playing. You just never know what you’re going to get when you have kids.”
Fran and Lindsay’s relationship developed a new dynamic since Lindsay joined the program, one in which Lindsay said she can’t look at Fran as a mother while in the gym. But Lindsay said the dynamic is easier to manage than she originally expected.
“I’ll call her ‘Fran’ on the gym and ‘mom’ at home,” Lindsay said. “It’s actually really easy for us to switch back and forth from mom-daughter, coach-player.”
A year ago, when Fran could only spectate her daughter’s games, Lindsay said she played better when her mother wasn’t there, saying she was bad luck.
But Lindsay played best match to date on Sept. 4 with 20 assists on 25 attempts, three kills and six digs against the University of Michigan — with her mother as coach instead of a spectator.
Fran said Lindsay’s success isn’t the result of bad luck disappearing but rather her hard work over the summer paying off.
Although Lindsay has come a long way and is poised to be a big contributor for the next four years, Fran said she needs to continue working hard like she did over the summer if she hopes to lead LSU to another NCAA Tournament.
“I’m proud of her for what she’s done, but she’s still a work in progress, and she has a lot more development in front of her to really truly be a significant setter for a program for the future,” Fran said.

Gallery • 6 Photos

Javier Fernández

LSU volleyball coach Fran Flory and freshman setter Lindsay Flory (16) get ready before practice on Wednesday, Sept. 02, 2015 at the Pete Maravich Assembly center