Players close their eyes and place their palms on their thighs. Petrone asks them to take a deep breath. He's reading from a script he put together on his phone.
"Check in with your mood," he says. "Check in with your arousal level."
"The game is starting. Let's go through some of those first touches."
Fairbanks twitches. Like her body is reacting to her brain as it focuses on the moment.
"It's 25-25 in the first set. Go through a rally in which you win the point. Go through another rally."
"We're 24-22 in the fourth set. Go through the match-winning rally. See the group coming together in the end."
"Breathe in and out," Petrone says. "And, when you're done, open your eyes."
They take a collective inhale.
One after the other, they run out of the locker room. They make a circle on the court. They go around, doing a roll call. "Yeah, Rachel," "Let's go V," they scream. Each person dances in the center of the circle.
The hunt is on.
IN 1787, WHEN the University of Pittsburgh became one of the first universities in North America, panthers roamed the Pennsylvania hills. The large cats stealthily hunted deer and raccoons and porcupines in the forests around the forts that would come to be known as "Steel City." The powerful predators were long gone from the area, migrating south, when Pitt adopted the Panther as its mascot in 1909.
The Pitt volleyball program was founded in 1974, and the panther's hunter mindset is paramount to the program today. Over the years, players have engaged in organized exercises to visualize themselves as predators and incorporated their tactics into Pitt's style of play. Setters run a quick-strike offense. Hitters swing high and hard. Blockers elevate big and bold. They pummel their serves and control the pace and emotion of the game. They are loud when they take the court and loud during points. There is no hesitation. Tipping is taboo.
Players point to the 2023 regional final against Louisville, to a moment when Pitt trailed its ACC rival two sets to none, as an example.
During the break, Babcock made eye contact with Vazquez Gomez and Torrey Stafford, an outside hitter with the second-most kills to Babcock. Wordlessly, the three exited their sold-out home gym and made their way to the women's bathroom next to the main entrance. They needed to get away from the bright lights and the thousands of eyeballs.
They had five minutes before the third set.
They shut the bathroom door and formed a circle, clasping each other's hands. Their eyes focused on the gray floor.
"One, two, three," one of them muttered. They don't remember who.
A guttural scream followed. It grew louder and louder until they felt like their insides were shaking. Several seconds passed. They continued, the bellow echoing across the bathroom.
At exactly the same time, Fairbanks ran to the Pitt locker room to do the same thing. She screamed and screamed until she couldn't hear her own thoughts.
When they ran out of breath, they slowed down, then stopped entirely. They took a deep breath and shook their heads. With their ears ringing, they made their way back to the court.
"We looked at each other, and we're like there's no way we aren't winning this game," Fairbanks says.
Fisher had no idea the players had gone off to scream -- a practice he learned from an Eastern European coach back in his playing days that he brought to Pitt -- but they vibrated with predator energy and he could feel it in his soul. He smiled.
"That was some of the best volleyball we ever played after that," Fairbanks says.
The home crowd -- which was packed to capacity at 2,800 -- was quiet during the first two sets. But when the players got back onto the court for the third set, they couldn't hear a thing. The Pittsburgh fans responded to the team's energy with their own.
"Maybe they all screamed, too," Fairbanks says.
When the third set began, Pitt looked transformed. They dug every ball. They jumped high and blocked hard. Fisher, standing in front of a crowd of loud Louisville fans, hooted, punching his fists in the air. They won the third set. In the fourth, when Babcock went to the service line and looked to Fisher for advice, he yelled "hammer it in." She did. Five times in a row. Fisher screamed, jumping up and down in excitement. It was the most animated the staff had ever seen him, so much so that they thought he was going to chest bump them. (He didn't.)
Pitt won the fourth set.
In the final set, Cat Flood, with her fiery hair -- black on one side and platinum blonde on the other -- went on a serving spree to make it 7-1 Panthers. A Fairbanks assist, her 48th of the match, sent Pitt to its third straight final four.
Five days later, Pitt met five-time national champion Nebraska in Tampa, Florida. Walking onto the court, the Pitt players felt nervous. The moment felt too big, their résumé too small. In key moments, they let Nebraska control the points. They lost in straight sets -- their third final four loss in as many years.
When they walked back to the locker room, seething and sweat dripping down their backs, they made eye contact. They all had the same thought: Get me back to the gym tomorrow. I want to win a national championship.
"The anger turned to hunger," Fairbanks says.
