Senior setter Madison Hammill has totaled 545 assists, 244 digs and 23 services aces for Wisconsin this season.
Submitted photo
Madison Hammill didn’t see the floor when Wisconsin won its first NCAA volleyball championship two years ago.
Now she’s a senior setter who’s a major part of the Badgers’ lineup heading into the season’s final weekend, but the former Center Grove star doesn’t feel any differently about this year’s tournament run than she did about that one.
“I think the special thing about being a part of this program is no matter how big of a piece you have to the outside world, from top to bottom, I don’t think I give any more than somebody who’s seen the court maybe for a couple of points this year,” Hammill said.
In 2021, Hammill was that somebody who seldom saw the court, appearing in just three matches as a serving specialist. But she’s shared the setter spot with classmate Izzy Ashburn in the Badgers’ 6-2 setup ever since, and she’s a big part of why Wisconsin has returned to the national semifinals this fall.
Coach Kelly Sheffield’s squad faces Texas in the second of two matches tonight at Amalie Arena in Tampa, Florida; Nebraska and Pittsburgh clash in the first at 7 p.m.
Wisconsin is 30-3 this season and was ranked No. 1 in the country for much of the fall. All of their losses came on the road in Big Ten play — a four-setter at Penn State and five-set defeats at Nebraska and Purdue — and they’ve balanced all of those with home wins, most recently one over the Nittany Lions last week in an NCAA regional semifinal.
Sunday afternoon’s national championship match could offer a possible rubber match against the Cornhuskers, but Hammill isn’t allowing herself to think past tonight’s semi.
“It’s really only Texas,” she said. “No match is guaranteed except for the one right in front of you.”
The Badgers will be looking to make their fourth title-match appearance in 11 years under Sheffield, who never played the sport himself but has become one of its most successful coaches through a tireless work ethic and a perpetual thirst to improve.
Hammill — who officially goes by MJ, not Madison, on Wisconsin’s roster — has known Sheffield for more than eight years now; she committed to the Badgers during the fall of her freshman year at Center Grove. She not only continues to marvel at his drive, but strives to follow his lead.
“He’s just a student of the game,” she said. “He doesn’t have an ego of his own, and so he’s constantly learning, constantly pushing himself to look for new ways to win, pushing to be the best, reassessing whatever he’s doing. And I think when your leader of the ship is doing that, you have no choice but to follow along, really. When you see a coach who’s been on it for this long constantly looking at what they can do better, it’s like, shoot, I’m the player. I have to be doing that as well; I want to be doing that as well.”
Much like her coach, Hammill doesn’t seem to think that her lifetime of success in volleyball counts for all that much. The closer you get to the top of the sport, she says, the more avenues toward improvement you see. Even among the very elite players, there are levels to it.
Perfection is impossible in a “game of errors,” but that won’t stop Hammill from shooting for it.
“I want to get every hitter a one-on-one,” she said. “I want to set every hitter in a perfect situation. I want to keep every single ball in system no matter where the pass is. I need to have every single dig, even when we’re out of system, be in system. Just different things like that. And that’s just the beginning.”
Off the court, Hammill’s years in Madison are just the beginning. She’s set to graduate with a bachelor’s degree in biomedical engineering, and she plans to pursue a master’s degree and eventually a doctorate in nursing with a goal of becoming a nurse practitioner.
Might there be another career possibility on the court that comes before that, though?
Women’s volleyball has had a landmark year. Nebraska’s match at the school’s football stadium in late August drew a sellout crowd of 92,003 fans, the largest crowd ever drawn for a women’s sporting event in the United States. This weekend’s NCAA action figures to attract even more eyeballs across the country and beyond, with both semifinals airing on ESPN and the final being shown on ABC.
That type of exposure is creating more opportunities for elite players — the Pro Volleyball Federation begins its inaugural season next month and will be adding a franchise in Indianapolis in 2025. But while the new league offers Hammill a chance to continue playing — and her statement that she’s done playing “collegiate sports” after this weekend at least hints that it’s a consideration — she says that it’s not really on her radar right now.
“I’ve just been really in this moment,” Hammill said. “I really haven’t let my mind wander to anything outside of that. But I think it’s really exciting for the sport to be growing the way that it is.”
The focus right now is winning this evening’s match against the Longhorns and enjoying these final days playing volleyball alongside her closest friends. As previously stated, nothing after tonight is guaranteed.
But when pressed about it, though, Hammill does admit that closing out her Wisconsin career with a second national title would be pretty damn sweet.
“I mean, I think anybody can imagine that’s the dream, right?” she said.
Making it come true is now a two-step process. The first one comes tonight.
IF YOU WATCH
NCAA Championship
Tampa, Florida
Today
Nebraska vs. Pittsburgh, 7 p.m. (ESPN)
Wisconsin vs. Texas, 9:30 p.m. (ESPN)
Sunday
Championship, 3 p.m. (ABC)
