Junior Molly Berezowitz (No. 11) believes she can always find a way to bring more energy to the UK volleyball team. (Vicky Graff Photo)
Maddie Berezowitz was part of Kentucky’s 2020 national championship volleyball team and part of four straight Southeastern Conference championship teams. Even though she didn’t play a lot of Kentucky’s talented 2020 team, no one had more fun than Berezowitz and did more to make sure her teammates were having fun as well.
Her younger sister, Molly, transferred from Marquette to UK this season and now is a backup libero to all-SEC libero Molly Tuozzo. However, Molly Berezowitz also has an important role — she also had 57 digs in UK’s first eight matches — as the team’s cheerleader on and off the court.
“She’s always having a great time no matter what’s going on and always making sure she’s picking up the people around her. It’s really fun to play with her and she helps make us all better,” said UK teammate Lizzie Carr.
None of Molly Berezowitz’s teammates were at UK when her sister played from 2019-2022. However, coach Craig Skinner has told her she has a lot of “similarities” to her older sister and he likes what she does.
“If I see we don’t have the energy, I am going to try and find a way to pick it back up,” the junior libero said.
The junior from Burlington, Wisconsin, averaged 1.97 digs per set in 2024 and had 213 total digs and 15 service aces. She had a career-high 21 digs in a NCAA Tournament win over host Utah.
So why transfer to Kentucky knowing she likely would get much less playing time with Tuozzo locked in at libero?
“My sister played here and she absolutely loved her experience,” the Kentucky junior said. “When I ended up going in the portal, Kentucky was always in the back of my mind. I love Craig, loved the other coaches as well, and so honestly it was basically an easy decision for me because of how highly my sister talked about the Kentucky volleyball program, Kentucky athletics, Kentucky as a whole.
“My sister would always tell me how much she loved it. I just wanted to be part of something so special. One of the reasons I transferred here is because this is one of the top programs consistently in the nation, and I like competition. Me and Tuozzo are great friends. Competition is what makes you a better person. That’s what makes you a better athlete.
“If you don’t have a competition in your gym, there’s no one to push each other. So that’s part of why our program is so good. Everyone is pushing each other at every position. Craig always talks about how you need to push the others in your position. So it’s cool to have someone so good at my position to push her to be better every day and she also pushes me to be better every single day.”
Berezowitz works to find ways to get on the court. She can be a serving replacement or a defensive specialist because unless she’s injured, Tuozzo — UK’s most athletic player — is not coming off the court.
“You can compare my position to a quarterback. Molly is the starter and I am the backup quarterback,” Berezowitz said. “My goal is just to help Molly (Tuozzo). Whatever I see, I’ll try to inform her of that. It’s easier to do that in a game than practice, but in a practice it’s like we have to compete because we need to make each other better.”
While pay-for-play has created a new look for football, basketball and maybe baseball, there’s not an abundance of revenue sharing or NIL dollars for volleyball players. However, Berezowitz says that’s not an issue for UK volleyball.
“I would say there are only a few volleyball players that are seeing huge numbers (financially). It’s not like football and basketball and that’s just known,” Berezowitz said. “Something we always harp on at Kentucky is we don’t really talk about money that much. That’s not what we’re about. Kentucky volleyball is about winning and just becoming better players and people. That’s not going to change and that’s why I wanted to be here.”
