Shockers v UCF

[flyingMoose]

This weekend are the first conference home games. T-shirts! Woot!

Of the Florida pair, UCF comes to town first with a 7 pm match on Friday. The Knights are clearly the best team in the AAC and may well be the only team from the conference to make the NCAA Tournament. But it is early. The current RPI for UCF is 18 with a projected RPI (that Pablo thing) of 15.

The Knights opened their conference schedule with 3-0 wins against East Carolina and Cincinnati.

Web site article for this weekend's matches.

[1972Shocker]

Pretty good effort by the Shocks tonight as they took UCF to 5 sets before falling (20), 21, 21, 12 and 12. The Shocks just couldn't quite match the depth of fire power that UCF can bring to bear.

Having Morgan Weber back in the lineup gave the Shocks a big lift. She played very well, especially considering she has't seen the floor in a march in just a little over a month. Morgan hit 14-7-41 =.171 and contributed 2 aces (vs 0 service errors), 9 digs and 3 assists in a 6 rotation role.

Brylee Kelly was also very good tonight especially after a very poor showing last week hitting 18-4-39 = .359. Good to see her and Kayce connecting well.

Morgan Stout and Natalie Foster were okay in the middle. Natalie's elbow didn't seem to be much of any issue and she served quite often as well. Natalie has a really tough serve but she has a high risk serve that usually just clears the net or catches the net. Natalie also had 7 digs and she is surprisingly good on the back row for a lanky 6-4 player.

Sophia Rohling continues to struggle as she hit 9-7-32 =.062. Opposing defenses seem to have her game pretty well figured out plus she still has too many unforced errors.

All-in-all a step in the right direction if it can be sustained and built upon. i think having a solid 6 rotation player (Weber) back in the lineup thsi match helped a lot.

Kailin Newsome and Lauren McMahon were not suited up tonight. Kailin seemed to be moving around okay on her bad ankle but Big Mac is in some kind of walking boot and sat with her leg elevated. Maybe we will get Kailin back for next weekends matches. Looks like it will be awhile for Big Mac, if she makes back at all this season.

The Shocks have now dropped 5 in a row. Hopefully, they can break that streak Sunday vs USF who lost in 4 sets at Tulsa tonight.

[flyingMoose]

Web site article and nice RH article by Sully.

I thought I saw more variety in the shot selection for the offense. Maybe some of it was desperation. :)

[1972Shocker]

Web site article and nice RH article by Sully.

I thought I saw more variety in the shot selection for the offense. Maybe some of it was desperation. :)

Clearly, Kayce and Brylee had perhaps their best connection of the year going last night. Hopefully, that continues. Maybe UCF simply wasn't prepared for MorganW as she had only played in 2 of the 3 matches to open the weekend in late August. I really like Natalie's game but not sure physically if she can handle a heavy workload at this point. It will be interesting to see how her elbow is on Sunday. She only took about 3 swings per set against UCF plus a regular rotation on the service line. MorganS is doing about as well as one could expect considering her injury situation last year. Sophia continues to struggle and Sophie is probably not quite ready to be a key contributor. Being selected as a preseason All-Conference player may have been the worst thing that could have happened to Sophia between the added expectations and added attention from opponents defenses that come with that.

No real surprises in the AAC this week other than the Shocks taking 2 sets off of UCF last night. Houston picked up a nice 3-1 win over Tulane in New Orleans on Wednesday.

At this point the Shocks joing USF and Temple at 0-3 at the bottom of the AAC standings. However, the Shocks have faced 3 of the top teams in the conference so far so hopefully things will go better for them on Sunday against USF. That is a match they can and, IMO, must win.

[flyingMoose]

Sophia continues to struggle ... Being selected as a preseason All-Conference player may have been the worst thing that could have happened to Sophia between the added expectations ...

Okay, I will ask the obvious as you have alluded to it. How much of her troubles are between her ears? As in, she just can't believe in herself.

[1972Shocker]

Okay, I will ask the obvious as you have alluded to it. How much of her troubles are between her ears? As in, she just can't believe in herself.

I would agree that self-confidence is pretty important for an athlete.to perform at a high level. I have no idea if self-doubt is impacting Sophia or not. You would think some self-doubt might be creeping into her psyche the more she struggles. I also don't know if she is totally healthy or might be dealing with some physical issues.

The only players on the Shocker stat sheet who have hitting percentages for the season below Sophia's 0.155 are Skylar Goering, the back up setters and a couple of defensive specialists. Clearly, we need Sophia to find her mojo. Last year Sophia hit .260. This year she has reverted back the level she hit as a raw freshman in 2019.

[1972Shocker]

The Shocks and UCF were tied at 8-all in the 5th set before UCF won 7 of the final 11 points. Of those 7 points, 2 came on UCF kills, 4 came on Shocker attack errors and 1 on a Shocker service error.

[WuDrWu]

It just felt like we weren't quite ready to win that match.

This team needs some success on the scoreboard (and a healthy roster).