How do I set the jQuery UI Slider value programmatically and fire events?

I have a slider defined like so:

$("#slider").slider({
        orientation: "vertical",
        range: "min",
        min: 0,
        max: totalRows,
        value: totalRows,
        slide: function(e, ui) {
          scrollTheTable(ui.value, totalRows, visibleRows, $table);
        }
      });

When using the slider, the function assigned to slide gets called no problem. I have a table that may or may not contain a row that has a class of SelectedItem. I am working on a method that will "scroll" that row to the top of the table on page load basically.

The meat of the method looks like this:

$("#slider").slider('value', $rows.length - index);

This property sets the slider value and the slider renders properly, but my slide handler is never called to do the work on the table.

What am I missing here?