Power outage can’t stop Arizona volleyball’s Destiny Ndam-Simpson from making a big spark

Maybe a little too electric.

Due to a monsoon storm that hit the area, the power went out at McKale Center at Alkeme Arena during the third set of the match, triggering the emergency lights and forcing the match to end early. 

Before the power outage, the Wildcats were fighting back against the Lopes in an attempt to secure their third-set win after winning the first two sets, 25-17 and 25-22. The score in the third set was 27-27.

And then … darkness. 

As the emergency lights kicked on, the Wildcats and Lopes waited around the court in hopes that the power would return and the match could continue.

To kill time, the whole Arizona volleyball team took a group photo with a bunch of middle schoolers from Southern Arizona who were attending the match. The teenagers squealed with excitement as they snapped a photo they could share with all their friends. 

With McKale Center running on its backup batteries, the exhibition match was over, and the Wildcats secured their first win ahead of the regular season.

But the power outage wasn’t the only thing electric about the match.

Outside hitter Destiny Ndam-Simpson was lightning on the court.

In the first set, she struck first and ended the set with five kills and a .500 hitting percentage.

But her streak was far from over. Ndam-Simpson would go on to record four kills in the second set and three kills in the shortened third set. 

You could definitely hear when she would strike because she had one of, if not the, loudest hits every time she came into contact with the ball.

Ndam-Simpson, a new member of the Arizona team and a transfer from Creighton, was already on head coach Charita Stubbs' radar well before her time in Tucson.

“We knew who Destiny was. I knew who she was prior to her going to Creighton. We didn't get an opportunity to recruit her, but we knew who she was; she was familiar (to us),” Stubbs said in a preseason press conference earlier this week. “Knew she was in a gym where she was training a lot and training against great players. Part of that is in this transfer portal era, there are a lot of great players that don't play, so they look at that as a knock against her.

“The other thing was she was very diligent about her recruiting process, which I truly appreciated. …  I think she talked with over 30 schools right off the bat, which was pretty impressive. And knowing that she was driven and what she had to fight through and what she endured there was very appealing to us.”

While at Creighton, Ndam-Simpson recorded 249 kills across 134 sets. She was also one of only two players in program history to log 10 or more kills in her first four starts.

However, it wasn’t always smooth sailing at Creighton.

She suffered a season-ending injury in 2025, and at some point in her three-season career there, she was relegated to the back row of the formation, according to Stubbs.

“She embraced it,” Stubbs said. “That's something that's very valuable. It's like you accept the role you have and then you make a decision to do what's best for you afterwards. But she never complained along the way, so I really appreciated that. … 

“It literally just told me who she was as a person. We want high-character young women to come in here that can clearly play, as well, but all those other pieces, especially when times get hard. I literally told her in my conversation, I said, ‘You're nothing like the things I was being led to believe. You're the complete opposite.’ She was like, thank you for believing what she was saying about herself and she reflected that when she started playing.”

Creighton, located in Omaha, Nebraska, is a major hotspot for volleyball in the U.S., and Ndam-Simpson says “volleyball is kind of the heartbeat of the city.”

Transferring from a school where volleyball takes precedence to a whole new city, school and team was a lot easier than expected.

“It's been seamless since getting here in July,” Ndam-Simpson said at a press conference earlier this week. “You have a lot of time where it's just us and the girls or the other girls on the team in the weight room, and you're getting in conditioning late or open gym right away. But there's no coaches around, so it’s basically easy to bond volleyball-wise. I feel like everyone's very accepting, and you know, just want to get better. So it's been very easy to fit in and I've enjoyed it a lot so far.”

Ndam-Simpson could’ve transferred to a lot of places, but one of the main reasons she chose Arizona was for the culture.

“... I didn't meet any of the girls in person, but you can tell through the coaches the kind of culture that they cultivate and the kind of people they have around and it's very easy to tell that you gotta want to be here, but this is the right place for you. There's a community and there's a team and a support staff that wants to have you here.”

The Wildcats, including Ndam-Simpson, head to Albuquerque this week for their last exhibition game on Saturday against New Mexico. Arizona begins regular-season play at home on Aug. 28 against Prairie View A&M.

After what transpired on the court Wednesday, we’re sure we’ll see a lot more from Ndam-Simpson this season.

Hopefully in the light.