Team-First Finau Always There To Give An Assist
November 13, 2017 | Volleyball
By Rich Myhre
SEATTLE - In five seasons with the University of Washington volleyball team, Jade Finau has seen her share of highs and lows.
Plenty of the former, to be sure. But certainly moments of the latter, too.
A 2013 graduate of Kirkland's Juanita High School, Finau redshirted her first season at Washington and then played sparingly as a backup setter the next three seasons. It seemed she could never please UW head coach Keegan Cook, who often was on her about something. First to improve her serve, then to become a better defender, and always making it clear she needed to raise her game.
"I was really tough on her," Cook now admits.
But if all that criticism was steady and sometimes severe, it was not without purpose. If Finau was ever to be a regular contributor for the Huskies, she needed to be pushed, not pampered. And ultimately she was faced with a choice -- either get better or give up.
She chose the former.
Finau committed herself to becoming a better server, "and now she's got a great serve," Cook said. She also went to work on her defense, "and now she's a great defender," he said.
"I did not ever lower the bar in terms of what I expected from her … and she just kept meeting those high expectations," Cook added.
And even though her skills needed polishing, her work ethic was terrific all along.
"I can't remember a day she's missed practice for any reason," said Cook, who is in his third season as Washington's head coach. "She has a tremendous ability to show up every day and go to work. And regardless of how much she's playing or how big her role is, the way she practices looks the same every single day. That's something I really respect about her."
Finau, a fifth-year senior, "has come farther than maybe any player I've coached in my career in terms of where she started when she got here and where she's at now," Cook said. "(She's shown) tremendous growth over the course of her five years here."
All that improvement has produced a corresponding jump in Finau's playing time this season. After beginning the season in a supporting role again to All-Pac-12 setter Bailey Tanner, a switch to a 6-2 rotation a few weeks into the conference season has resulted in Finau becoming a regular in the rotation as UW makes its postseason push.
Being on the court more in her final season "is definitely a great opportunity and I'm trying to take advantage of it the best I can," Finau said. "I love it because my family gets to watch me play. Now they can see how much I've grown over the years since my (playing) time was limited the last four years.
"It's just a great feeling being out there. My confidence level has definitely gone up."
Finau, who grew up in Marysville and still calls that city home, comes from a family that has produced a pair of UW athletes. Jarett Finau, her brother, played on the football team (2011-14), as did cousin Taniela Tupou (2012-15).
In fact, the day Jade Finau made a recruiting visit to the campus while still in high school, she met in the office with then-UW head coach Jim McLaughlin. Unknown to Finau, McLaughlin had arranged for Jarett Finau to drop in unannounced.
"That got me," she said, smiling at the memory. "I knew it was meant for me to be here (at Washington)."
In her first season of 2013, the Huskies reached the NCAA Tournament's Final Four, held that year at Seattle's KeyArena. Though she didn't play due to her redshirt status, it remains a highlight of her UW experience.
"My freshman year we made it to the Final Four and that was a huge deal," she said. "The older girls, they just looked like they had everything together. Just being exposed to something like that early on was amazing, and it hit me from the very beginning."
Since then, she added, "the thought of being here at a prestigious university and playing in a high-level program, it's been a huge blessing."
As a setter, Finau has to fill one of the primary roles in volleyball. Much like a quarterback in football, the ball touches the setter's hands on almost every possession. And the decisions a setter must make are a big factor in whether or not the team succeeds.
"It's such an important role," Finau said. "As a setter, you have to know where everyone's at and you have to know what's going on. You have to be consistent in the way you look and the way you carry yourself around the team. In a lot of ways and at a lot of times, the team looks to the setter if they're struggling.
"When you show your teammates that you have confidence in them, they want to play for you. They want to play better for you and for the team, and that's the best thing I could ever give these girls. (To show) I'm very confident in them."
According to Cook, Finau's influence goes beyond her contributions on the court. As one of the older players on the team, she has become both a mentor and a confidante for some of her younger teammates.
"She doesn't hang out with a lot of them socially because she's with her family a lot," Cook said. "But when (the other players) need her, she's there. She always seems to appear when someone's in a time of distress. She says, 'I'll be sitting in the team room and all of sudden someone comes up to me and starts telling me their problems.' … She's there when she's needed as a voice of calm and reason."
On and off the court, he said, "she'll do anything for her teammates."
Finau graduated last June with a degree in cultural anthropology. She will leave school at the end of fall quarter and began exploring future opportunities, which could include playing more volleyball overseas as a professional. But her long-term career goal is to tap into another of her passions -- music.
She began taking piano lessons when she was 3, she likewise plays the guitar and ukulele, and she also sings. Her dream is to work in the artists and repertoire department for a record label, essentially becoming a talent scout seeking out promising musicians. The job, she explained, "is kind of like the middlemen that sign artists or music producers or songwriters to labels. It's kind of a behind-the-scenes person, but they go and find the talent."
Though Finau is not planning a performance career of her own, she certainly has musical talent.
"When we go down to Oregon every year, there's a piano (in the lobby) of the hotel we stay at," Cook said. "Jade will always jump on it and do her thing, and the whole team will come down and we'll sing Christmas carols. … She's tremendously gifted in that regard. A really talented kid."
As the Huskies approach the end of their regular season, and with the start of the postseason just ahead, Finau knows her time at Washington is down to its final few weeks. The Huskies will make the NCAA Tournament again, as they have every year since 2002, and then try to prevail through the 64-team field.
"Coming into UW, it's everyone's dream to win a national championship," Finau said. "Here at Washington we've been so close so many times, and now that I'm older I realize that the most important thing to me with this team is how we're striving together. Especially through adversity because that's something we embrace every week. Something happens, somebody goes down, but our team will figure out a way to take it head on and just keep moving forward."
To win a national championship, she said, "would mean the world to me. With the group of girls we have this year, we've bonded and our connections with each other are so strong. I wouldn't want to win a national championship with anyone else but them."
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