Brittany Howard's mom, Eileen Dempster Howard, was a three-time All-American and Hall of Famer at the University of the Pacific. StanfordPhoto.com

When Kelsey Humphreys walks out of the team locker room at Stanford, headed to the court at Maples Pavilion, she goes past the hanging photos of the Cardinal's all-time All-Americans, a star-studded list that includes Kerri Walsh Jennings, Kristin Folkl, Ogonna Nnamani and Logan Tom.

And then there's the photo of Wendy Rush Humphreys, the Cardinal's four-time All-American setter.

Kelsey Humphreys' mother, Wendy Rush Humphreys, was a four-time All-American setter for the Cardinal. StanfordPhoto.com

"It's a picture of her in a setting position, so I usually stop and give her a high-five on my way out," Kelsey Humphreys said. "It's pretty cool to share something like that with my mother."

And fairly cool that she shares the same experience with a few of her teammates for No. 1-ranked Stanford, which is host to No. 11 Oregon in a battle of unbeatens Friday (10 p.m. ET, ESPNU). Humphreys, a sophomore setter, is one of three Cardinal players whose mothers were collegiate volleyball standouts, each of them Hall of Famers at their respective schools.

Junior starting setter Madi Bugg's mom, Robin Maine Bugg, is in the Tennessee Athletics Hall of Fame after a distinguished volleyball career.

And junior outside hitter Brittany Howard's mother, Eileen Dempster Howard, was a three-time All-American and Hall of Famer at the University of the Pacific in Stockton, California.

"People come up to me after games and tell me they remember when my mom played here and I think that's great," said Humphreys, who is in a starting role for the first time in her young career. "I wanted to come to Stanford for my own reasons. I'm here to make my own impact on the program."

Bugg wears No. 22 because it was her mother's number in college, and her mother cried a little when she told her.

"I'm very proud of her and I tell people that all the time," Madi Bugg said. "It probably comes up more than it normally would for other people."

Their mothers are undoubtedly equally proud of their accomplished daughters, who find themselves a part of one of the premier college programs in the history of the sport, and among the top-ranked teams in the country this season.

None of the three players, however, would consider herself "groomed" for this particular outcome, despite their mothers' successes.

Humphreys said her mother never pushed volleyball ahead of anything else.

"I played a lot of different sports," Humphreys said. "I was the one who asked to play volleyball. I don't think she wanted me to start as early as I did. And volleyball wasn't really my focus until high school."

Madi Bugg's mom, Robin Maine Bugg, is in the University of Tennessee Athletics Hall of Fame. StanfordPhoto.com

Howard, on the other hand, was playing jump and spike with a balloon with her mom almost as far back as she can remember.

"She was crafty about it," Howard said. "She would ingrain little volleyball things in my head. We'd be in the backyard practicing passing techniques. But she's never really coached me. She's just always been there if I had questions."

Bugg, on the other hand, was coached by her mother. For years. Bugg's mother and father, Dick, ran volleyball club programs in Dallas, Utah and New Hampshire.

She joked that when she was little she was always "getting dragged to the gym."

"And I got tired of playing on the side and I wanted to play on my own team," Bugg said. "I was the one who pushed it."

Soon, she was playing for her mother on club teams. By the time she got to be a sophomore in high school, Bugg said it got more difficult. She said she was playing on an 18-and-under team as a 15-year-old because the team needed a setter.

"I wasn't really ready to be on that team, and she was really hard on me," Bugg said. "But we had a rule that once you get in the car, you don't talk about practice anymore."

Bugg, a second-team All-American as a sophomore last year, also said it was difficult to hear her teammates complain about her mom.

"Everybody gets mad at their coach sometimes, and no one was ever mean, but it was difficult when they were unhappy with her," Bugg said.

The three players feel they have a connection because of their shared experience. All say they have never felt pressure to live up to their mothers' achievements.

"She's always been a great role model and example for me and I want to be just like her," Howard said. "But I have never felt like I have to be as good as her or get all the awards she had. She's just a great example and it's great motivation."

Howard's and Humphrey's mothers played together after college, and at one point they were pictured together in a local advertising campaign for a technology company. Someone dug up the ad last year and showed it to the girls.

"It was a picture of Kelsey's mom setting my mom and the headline said 'Perfect Partner.'" Howard said. "Now Kelsey sets me. How crazy that it works out like that?"