26 The Statement // ednesday, September 15, 2010
Wednesday, September 152010 The Statement 7
the
tstatement
Magazine Editor:
Trevor Calero
Editor in Chief.
Jacob Smilovitz
Managing Editor:
Matt Aaronson
Deputy Editor:
Jenna Skoller
Designers:
Sara Boboltz
Corey DeFever
Photo Editor:
Jed Moch
Copy Editors:
Erin Flannery
Danqing Tang
Cover Illustration:
Marissa McClain
The Statement is The Michigan
Daily's news magazine, distributed
every Wednesday during the
academic year. To contact The State-
met e-mail calero@michigandaily.
com
TH EJUNKD RAWER
random student interview
This is Will Grundler from
The Michigan Daily. We're
reintroducing a feature
called Random Student Interview.
Would you like to participate?
Yes.
State your name for the record.
Kristen [name redacted].
What do you like best about the
Daily?
I like the Sudoku.
The Sudoku? Not the award-win-
ningjournalism?
That's nice too. I mean, um ... yeah
the Sudoku.
Some have criticized the Daily
of being too funny and light-
humored. Do you disagree?
I disagree. I don't think they're too
funny. You're saying you need to be
more serious?
Moving on. So you know when
you're sitting in class and you
drop a pencil or pen and you
don't want to take your eyes off
the professor or the PowerPoint
to go look for it? So you grope
around without looking and you
never find it. And once you bend
down and do look for it it's a mil-
lion miles away?
Yeah.
What are your thoughts on that?
Well, hopefully someone around me
is nice enough to take their eyes off
whatever is going on to find the pen-
cil for me.
Is it acceptable inany situation for
a male student to cross his legs and
talk about literature at the same
time? Or are the two mutually
exclusive?
Why wouldn't it be acceptable to do
that at the same time?
Do you know what mutually exclu-
sive means?
Is this a trick question?
Just answer the question.
Sure. Sure it's fine. It might look a
little pretentious, but it's fine.
Do you believe in evolution?
Yes.
Really?
Yes.
Really? So you think we just came
to be at random? Do you think us
meeting is just chance, that life is
chance?
Yeah. I do actually.
On a related note, what makes
your life worth living? Cause it's
the subject of the theme semester.
And try to answer seriously.
Wow, that's pretty deep right there ...
Let me just stop you right there.
So you know when you're walking
on campus and another person is
walking inyour direction and even
though you're a good distance
away from each other it's always
at the last minute that you decide
to get out of each others' way and
you move in the same direction as
each other?
Yeah.
Do you think that's what makes
life worth living?
No. That's not what makes life worth
living.
Human contact?
Well yeah, human contact but not in
that form.
Oh, so sexual intercourse?
No. I'm not talking about sex. I'm
talking about love. Families. Spiritual
connections with people.
OK. So what major do you think
stands the least chance of getting
a girlfriend?
I guess it depends. If it were me I
would least date an undecided major.
Because they don't know what they
want in life and I need someone with
some sort of direction.
Is it ever acceptable for a male
student to wear socks above his
ankles and if the answer is no,
what sort of ridicule should he be
subjected to?
Is he wearingshorts?
Yes. That's a given.
It's not acceptable. Well ... is he hik-
ing?
No. Just walking to class.
It depends on how badly I feel for the
kid. If he wears his socks like that
over his ankles and it looks like his
mom told him to do that then I feel
pretty badly for him. But if he's doing
that on his own..
- Kristen is an LSA junior.
collegiate ranks quickly began.
By the end of Zimmerman's sopho-
more year of high school, Rosen said
Lexi's improvement caught his eye.
But the Rosens were behind when it
came to Lexi's recruitment. By the
time they had begun to recruit Zim-
merman, the coaching duo thought it
would be too late to get her.
But the Rosens were persistent
with the highly-touted Zimmerman
and ultimately convinced her to visit
Ann Arbor before her junior season
in August 2005. Once she arrived,
Rosen said, "it was one of those
things where you could feel it being
the right fit."
Zimmerman said this past May
that she wholeheartedly felt she
"needed" to come to Michigan - to
a place where maybe winning wasn't
the main objective. She said she
wanted to share the same values as
the coaches who would be instruct-
ing her for the next four years.
So, after not being on Michigan's
radar for too long, and without the
usual back-and-forth correspondence
of an already-established relation-
ship, Zimmerman had the Wolver-
ines' attention.
But there was one minor hiccup.
Another setter had the attention
of both Rosens long before they had
grown keen on acquiring Zimmer-
man, and they had already offered
the other player a scholarship, who
had not yet made a decision. But,
Rosen said, he liked Lexi better.
Rosen, however, had to be fair to
all parties. So, when Lexi asked him
what would happen if both she and
the other setter told him they wanted
to go to Michigan, he told her they
would take the other player because
"it's the fair thing to do."
But that didn't scare off Lexi. Fol-
lowing her unofficial visit from Ann
Arbor, Zimmerman notified Mark
that she wanted to be a Wolverine.
'I didn't realize what I would be
missing out on until I went on my
visit," Zinsmserman said. "And then
I said there was no way I was going
anywhere else."
The other setter was notified
about Michigan's interest in Zim-
merman, but she still wasn't ready
to commit, even after a couple
month's deliberation.
The Rosens then offered the
position to Zimmerman - boom -
game time.
There were about five setters
that everyone was recruiting in
the Midwest that year and once
Lexi committed to Michigan, the
rest "decided within the next three
days," Rosen said.
'It was like bam, bam, bam - she
got that thing going," Rosen said.
"You just didn't want to be the team
- it's like musical chairs - you
didn't want to be the team without
a chair."
ALWAYS HAPPY, NEVER SATISFIED
After Zimmerman received treat-
ment on her nagging right thumb -
which she injured in mid-October
last year at Michigan State - she
made her way over to the far end
zone of Cliff Keen Arena and fielded
a series of questions regarding her
three-plus years as a Wolverine.
The writing was on the wall, liter-
ally.
Sweet 16. Sweet 16. Elite Eight.
Those are the end results of Zim-
merman's first three years under
Rosen, a period of unprecedented
success for any Michigan volleyball
team in its almost 40 years of exis-
tence.
And with all three banners hang-
ing on the concrete wall adjacent to
the electronic scoreboard, Zimmer-
man could see the product of the
Wolverines' diligence during off-sea-
son workouts, the adversity they had
faced over the course of the season's
four-plus months and their commit-
ment to raising the bar of excellence,
when the bar hadn't even been lifted
yet.
None of those wins last season was
more impressive and more notewor-
thy than Michigan's three-set sweep
of No. 4 seed Stanford in the Sweet
16, not to mention the match was
played on the Cardinals' home floor
in Palo Alto, Calif.
When Zimmerman answered a
question about the significance of the
victory - which pushed the Wolver-
ines into the field of eight - she belt-
ed out an emphatic "Hell yeah." With
the two-word response, it's obvious
what kind of impact the win had on
the progress of the Michigan volley-
ball program, from where it has come
since the start of the Mark Rosen era
in 1999, and even spanning a shorter
time frame, the Lexi Zimmerman
era.
The banners, and what they stand
for, have had a big impact on Zim-
merman. But they also show her how
much further the team could go.
"We're all happy with the success
we've had and what we've accom-
plished, but it's made us realize that
if we can raise the bar to become a
team that consistently makes it to the
Sweet 16, then we can raise the bar
again and be ateam that goes a little
bit farther," she said. "The better you
get, the harder it is to get a little bit
better."
Without former Wolverines like
Beth Karpiak (2009) and Megan
Bower (2010), Michigan wouldn't
have made its way into national
contention, nor would it have gar-
nered the same amount of success
in the past three seasons. But look-
ing beyond Karpiak and Bower, only
one name comes to mind when con-
sidering the greatest influence on
Michigan volleyball: two-time AVCA
All-American Lexi Zimmerman.
"There's no question that she's had
the most impact on elevating our pro-
gram of anybody in the history of the
program," Rosen said.
Before arriving in Ann Arbor in
the fall of 2007, Zimmerman was
touted as the nation's No. 1 ranked
high school recruit. And now, in her
fourth and final year at Michigan
with an assist total of 4,916, Zimmer-
man will soon crush Linnea Men-
doza's all-time assist record of 5,072.
The list of the number of accom-
plishments she will eventually gar-
ner as a Wolverine goes on and on,
her most recent being selected as the
University's Female Athlete of the
Michigan
volleyball coach
Mark Rosen talks
strategy with
his team before
they take the
court against
Youngstown
State.
(MARISSA
MCCLAIN/
Daily)
Year. While Zimmerman will prob-
ably need another shelf or two at her
home in Barrington, Illinois to house
all her hardware, the awards and
honors aren't what motivate the out-
spoken and charismatic Zimmerman.
"We see past that banner there,"
said volleyball player Alex Hunt,
pointing to Zimmerman's AVCA All-
America second team banner inside
Cliff Keen, which she earned her
sophomore season. "She doesn't hang
her hat on that being up there. It's as
if that means nothing to her. I mean,
I'm sure it does, but it's not what she
lives on everyday."
So, what does motivate the once
Gatorade Player of the Year?
According to Zimmerman, she
wanted to seize the opportunity to
come to Michigan in order to take a
program to where it had never been
before, and to finally bring Michigan
onto the national stage.
To help bring the program its best
season ever, advancing the team to
the Elite Eight of the NCAA Tourna-
ment, was just icing on the cake.
BY THE NUMBERS
4,9916
CAREER ASSISTS
157
ASSISTS SHY OF BEING
MICHIGAN'S ALL-TIME
ASSISTS LEADER
2
AVCA ALL-AMERICA
TEAM SELECTIONS
"(Michigan) was knocking on
the door of success, and I was really
excited tobe a part of that," Zimmer-
man said. "I had two years to watch it
get closer and closer and then when I
finally got here, I was like, 'Put me in.'
I want to makea difference.'"
WANT TO
JOIN THE
MICHIGAN
DA ILY?
Come to our mass
meetings at 420
Maynard Street
at 7 p.m. on:
THURSDAY SEPT.16
MONDAY SEPT. 20
Brand new UM soccer complex
Frdiday, September 17th
2Games for the price of 1
5:OOPM Women's Soccer vs. UMass
7:3OPM Men's Soccer vs. Notre Dame
Come celebrate the new complex with both teams!
For more information, please contact
Stephanie Bowker or Julianna Crim
at dailydisplay cfgmail.com