Back in high school, Reese Messer committed to USC about as soon as it was possible for her to do so.
It was the summer after her sophomore year, and the setter from Olathe had made up her mind that she wanted to try going far from home for college and that USC was the right place to do it. And so she committed less than six days after it became possible for coaches to contact members of her recruiting class.
Looking back on that experience, she wishes she had taken visits. Not because she didn’t love her freshman year at USC — one in which the former Kansas Gatorade Player of the Year was first-team All-Big Ten and ranked in the top 10 nationally in assists per set — but simply because of how informative she found them as a transfer-portal entrant just a few months afterward.
“Being in the portal, honestly, I’m not going to lie, I kind of enjoyed it, which I bet a lot of people don’t say that,” Messer told the Journal-World in a recent interview. “But I just kind of saw it as an opportunity to really get to know these coaches and figure out what I want, what I don’t like … They’re very top-notch programs, and it was really cool to learn from each perspective, and how they move, and how they do their programs.”
Given her decorated first season, Messer was in high demand in the spring portal. She saw Creighton, defending champion Texas A&M, Arizona State and hometown Kansas, plus added on an unofficial visit to SMU — a school at which, she acknowledged, many people in the volleyball world thought she would be a “shoo-in.”
But in fact her commitment decision went down to “the final hour” — before she ultimately chose to come home.
“I just kind of sat through and prayed about it and just kind of realized KU is the place,” she said. “KU is where I want to thrive as a human and a volleyball player on and off the court, and I like the lifestyle at KU. I think who I am as a person, I liked who I was at KU, and I think that’s really important.”
Messer grew up going to KU volleyball games when Ray Bechard was head coach. She always appreciated the environment at Horejsi Family Volleyball Arena, and KU was “top four” for her as a high schooler. But her philosophy was “Go far, and if you don’t like it, you can come back” — which is precisely what she has ended up doing.
She stressed that she loved her teammates at USC, and felt supported, and certainly during her time in Los Angeles she learned a lot about the commitment it takes to be a college athlete. But she also felt acutely how distant she was from her friends and family in the Sunflower State: “I don’t think you realize how special a place Kansas is until you’re gone and you realize the support system I have here,” she said.
Returning to KU specifically was no guarantee. But Messer had a pretty strong feeling she was going to like the Jayhawks’ second-year coach Matt Ulmer, for whom she had a great deal of respect based on his tenure at Oregon: “I think he’s just so phenomenal and so great and so smart.” And he was a setter himself.
“I just want someone who has great experience,” Messer said, “and what he’s done at Oregon is incredible, and like I say he’s never had a bad team, like I can’t remember the last time he’s had a bad team. He just doesn’t. He just gets everything out of his players, which I love, and that’s what I want.”
Messer knew KU’s campus well, both from her general proximity and from an unofficial basketball visit in eighth grade, and she had a reliable and enthusiastic source within the program in the form of her former high school teammate at St. James Academy, KU defensive specialist Heidi Devers. (Not to mention that many of her non-volleyball friends attend the university.) So spending time with the coaches was a big focus of her visit.
Ulmer was direct with Messer in a couple ways. He told her she would be battling for a spot. (KU already has veteran setter Cristin Cline in the fold, as well as one of the top setters in high school volleyball, Marissa Jones, committed for 2027.) She loved that. He also spoke, she said, about his belief that the Jayhawks can compete for a national championship.
“And I just really like the idea of that, being the hometown kid, and really going all in on that,” Messer said.
She was also excited to hear that KU will attempt to play at a fast pace.
“I asked him, I was like, ‘Are you giving me full rein to try things and do different things?’, and he’s like, ‘Of course,'” Messer recalled, “which, that’s kind of what I was looking for too, was just a program that could let me just go be me and go be athletic and kind of just create stuff and be creative.”
Even as a sophomore, she will be one of the more experienced Jayhawks this fall, given that she’ll be joining a team with one senior compared to six freshmen as something of a seasoned starter.
“I just think when you have young people, I think they’re eager, not saying veterans aren’t, but I think they’re eager, and they want to learn,” Messer said, “and they’re just really open-minded, and so I think that’ll be really fun, and you can grow as a human with them.”
They’ll have to grow as a unit in a hurry when they all get on campus together in July (after Messer spends some time with the under-21 national team). That’s not necessarily new for Messer, who did not graduate early and so had to get to know all the Trojans pretty quickly last summer. Her thinking is “Well, I’ve done it once, I can do it again.”
Soon enough it’ll be time for that process to begin.
“We are very excited to welcome Reese home,” Ulmer said in a press release announcing Messer’s signing on Thursday. “She is an elite competitor and makes our gym better. She has high expectations for herself and the program. We can’t wait to get to work.”
