“I got a phone call that said, ‘You have one hour to get all of your stuff out of the PMAC or you will not see it until this is over,'” LSU volleyball coach Fran Flory said while recalling the Tigers’ eventful 2005 season.
Because of Hurricane Katrina, the 2005 LSU volleyball team was homeless.
On August 29, 2005, Hurricane Katrina made landfall on Louisiana’s Gulf coast and devastated the entire area.
The Tigers were in Statesboro, Ga., the weekend of the storm. They returned to Baton Rouge to find they were without a home until further notice.
“We scrambled and called a bunch of people with trucks and grabbed all of our nets, all of our balls, everything,” Flory said.
The Tigers did not play in the PMAC again until Oct. 14.
In the meantime, the Tigers’ home court was an emergency triage center for the injured.  Their practice facility, the auxiliary gym of the PMAC, had been converted into a makeshift morgue.
Before the Tigers took to the road again, they helped with the relief effort.
“We went and volunteered, holding babies who had been orphaned or who couldn’t find their parents in the [Carl Madddox] Field House,” Flory said. “Then I kind of pulled our team out of that because it was too emotional, so we went and washed laundry.”
Flory said washing the laundry was still rewarding.
“People would donate clothes, but the Red Cross doesn’t allow it to be handed out, even if it’s new, without being washed,” Flory said. “And you think washing laundry isn’t a big deal, but the joy that the people had of actually having clean clothes … was actually pretty cool.”
The Tigers, 3-0 at the time, were on the road for their next 14 matches. They started with four consecutive wins and nine wins in 10 matches.
As brutal as the long-term road trip sounds, Flory said it was good for her team to be able to temporarily escape.
“Atlanta was our first trip after that,” Flory said. “The whole bus just kind of breathed a sigh of relief. And we went and we played really well.”
Flory said the team knew how meaningful these games were for not just them but for the entire community.
“The kids, they were playing for the state,” Flory said.
When the Tigers returned home in October to face Mississippi State,
they boasted a 13-4 overall record, 3-3 in SEC play. Then-Athletic Director Skip Bertman was impressed.
“They have played every game on the road in a season that got underway in August,” Bertman said in a cyber-side chat in October 2005. “As the Maravich Center continued to undergo renovations,
Coach Flory had originally scheduled her first home match to be in late September.”
The Tigers defeated the Bulldogs in straight sets that night in the first of a 6-0 record at home. The undefeated home record helped propel LSU to a 21-8 overall record and its first-ever SEC West crown.
Five years down the road, the Tigers are five-time reigning SEC West champs and defending SEC overall champions.
Flory said the Katrina season was instrumental in catapulting the program to its current status.
“Our players are now able to adapt a little better,” Flory said.
“Adversity strengthens you. And I think as a coach I do a much better job of preparing kids for the what-might-happen.”
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Contact Rob Landry at [email protected]