Volleyball: Illinois Tournament ('Sep 1-2)

[Critter's Pa]

Live Stats is caught up, sorta. They have the game ending on an Annalie Ace, and I'm pretty sure that is wrong.

Sets 2 and 3 looked pretty good. No ties, no lead changes in set 2. Had a chance at set 4 after coming back from being down early. Set 4 had 9 ties and 4 lead changes. We gotta be able to close out these sets.

If you believe the stats Shocks hit .190 (59-28-163), Illinois hit .136 (55.23.169). 118 of those attempts came from Raina Terry (65) and Kayla Burbage (53). Burbage hit -.038 and Terry hit .231. Looks like the Shocks did a good job of containing one of their top hitters.

Coach really stuck with the line up. Emerson and Annalie alternated being in the starting line up for each set. MorganW turned in a double-double, 13 kills (13-5-34 .235) and 14 digs. It looks like they zeroed in on the middles. Natalie- 9-4-20 .250 with 3 block assists and MorganS- 11-3-21 .381 with 6 block assists. Izzi also had 6 block assists.

Not sure how bad the service errors were (in the net vs just barely long, e.g.), but can we have someone serve for Natalie? One ace is great, 5 service errors is not so good.

Good game. Good win. Feeling good going about tomorrow.

[JayPak]

Nice win over the B1G. Illinois State is terrible and you will beat them and win the tournament.

[flyingMoose]

From an "interested observer" on the VT thread for Illinois:

"Watched the final game. Can’t believe we lost that. We are big and slow.

We lost to much shorter athletic tenacious team who wasn’t afraid. The made us look like high school team."

[WuDrWu]

I mean it's not everyday you can have 6'3 - 6'6 young women that are also really fast/quick.

Kennedy Collins, their 6'3" grad middle is tough and strong, but she's got to be every bit of 210 or more. You can't have everything.

[WuDrWu]

Going to blame Illinois an underprepared embarrassment of an athletic program based on how they've managed things this weekend.

Bad stats yesterday, no stats today. Video is absolutely unwatchable.

Shocks look uninspired (the nicest way I can say it) but managed to pull away late in the 1st game 25-17. Might have won 9 of the last 10, something like that. How about just no more injuries and let's get on the bus.

[1972Shocker]

Going to blame Illinois an underprepared embarrassment of an athletic program based on how they've managed things this weekend.

Bad stats yesterday, no stats today. Video is absolutely unwatchable.

Shocks look uninspired (the nicest way I can say it) but managed to pull away late in the 1st game 25-17. Might have won 9 of the last 10, something like that. How about just no more injuries and let's get on the bus.

Thankfully Sophia came to play in that 1st set. The two dig saves that Sophia made at 21-17 were impressive. Unfortunately, not getting much from anyone else. Brylee and Ba still not playing.

Ba Koehler getting on the court in Set 2.

[WuDrWu]

Man, ISUr is BAD on the back row. They aren't toothless up front, but they're having a tough time even getting the ball there. Setting is an issue too.

Reagan Anderson getting some time in set 2. 25-14.

Ba is struggling, maybe more mentally than anything. Is Katie hurt too? Can't believe she's not getting some reps, even though the other littles have been playing well, especially Gabi.

[1972Shocker]

Reagan Anderson getting some time in set 2.

She is, but not really playing all that well. Is Annalie hurting or is Lambo just trying to give Reagan a baptism under fire. Gabi apparently sustained an injury to her left thigh late in the Illinois match. Has that pretty well wrapped.

Update: Annalie did play some and looked okay. Katie G came in late in the 4th set for a hand full of points and looked okay. So injuries there don't seem to be an issue.

So the banged up players appear to be Brylee, who did not play this weekend, Sophia, although she isn't playing like it, and now Gabi, although she played through whatever she did to her leg.

[1972Shocker]

The Shocks were better in Sets 2 and 3 and were good late in all 3 sets in a 17, 14, 13 sweep of the Redbirds.

For the match the Shocks outhit the Redbirds .316 to .087 in what turned out to be a pretty balanced attack.
Sophia: 10-2-16 = .500 plus 7 digs
Natalie: 7-0-13 = .538 plus 2 block solos and 3 block assists, 4 digs and 1 service ace to NO SERVICE ERRORS.
Emerson: 7-0-22 = .318 after a slow start.
Morgan-S: 7-0-15 = .467 also after a slow start
Morgan-W: Struggle on the attack at 0-2-9 = -.222 but had a very good floor game with 13 digs to lead the Shocks.
Barbara: 4-1-9 = .333 on the back half of the match with with 3 of her kills in the final set.

Izzi: 5-4-14 = .071 but was pretty solid setting the ball. Struggled this weekend on the attack. Maybe needs to be a bit more selective. She did have 2 service aces and no errors.

The Shocks only had 9 attack errors (9.2%) and 40.8% kill percentage. Both good numbers.

The Shocks had a 7 point advantage at the service line with 8 aces vs only 4 errors vs 4 aces and 7 errors for the Redbirds.

The Shocks had a significant statistical advantage pretty much across the board. The question is how much was that due to the play of the Shockers and how much was due to the play of the Redbirds who are picked to finish 7th in the MVC.

[Critter's Pa]

Going to blame Illinois an underprepared embarrassment of an athletic program based on how they've managed things this weekend.

For a while there, I thought the scorekeeper was going back to side-out scoring.

[1972Shocker]

3-2 is about where I thought the Shocks would be after two weekends although they did not get there exactly like I though they would and, if had known the injury issues we would be dealing with not sure I would have expected 3-2. Sure hope we can get relatively healthy by the time AAC play rolls around.

The Shocks will be hard pressed to split with KU and Colorado this Thursday and Saturday.

[BAShocker]

Probably tailgating here…can someone summarize the injury situation?

[Critter's Pa]

Natalie: 7-0-13 = .538 plus 2 block solos and 3 block assists, 4 digs and 1 service ace to NO SERVICE ERRORS.

...and there was much rejoicing!

I'm glad coach doesn't listen to me. I think she can be a good server. I think she is a little over 1 block per set.
Gabi had 3 aces and only 6 digs, way below her average. Was this because she is hurt?
MorganW made some nice digs. Coach finally had Ba swap out with her to play front row.
Katie found some court time. I was wondering if she was injured.
Annalie had a knee brace. Hope that doesn't become a nagging injury.
Reagan at times looks great and other times looks like she is trying to catchup with the speed of the game.

I'm impressed by the zero errors turned in by Natalie, Emerson, and MorganS. There was a definite misscommunication between Natalie and Izzi on one set, but I don't think that counts as an error, just a kill for Ill State.

Kinda poetic the Shocks hit .316. If they hit the area code the rest of the year, they will win a bunch of games.

[Veritas]

Always nice to see the Shox beat up on the MoVal

[1972Shocker]

...and there was much rejoicing!

I'm glad coach doesn't listen to me. I think she can be a good server. I think she is a little over 1 block per set.

I had Frosty with 10 serves with the Shocks scored on 4 of those. On her last serve the Shocks got a free ball that Morgan-S immediately free-balled back on the 1st touch after which the Redbirds scored. But this kind of serving accuracy from Frosty is more the exception then the rule. In any case, a really nice bounce back from her 5-error performance vs Illinois. She has one of the tougher serves on the team when she can find the range.

Reagan at times looks great and other times looks like she is trying to catchup with the speed of the game.

I would say Reagan looked good, not great, about half the time and not quite ready for prime time about half the time. But I can be a tough grader. She must be showing something good in practice as the depth chart at DS currently appears to be Gabi, Annalie, Reagan and Katie. Kylie Marneris appears to be the Volleyball team's version of Softball's Madyson Espinosa, Just needs to get a Cowboy hat.

I'm impressed by the zero errors turned in by Natalie, Emerson, and MorganS.

Yeah, I don't think 3 players with zero errors on double digit attemtps in the same match is very common.

There was a definite misscommunication between Natalie and Izzi on one set, but I don't think that counts as an error, just a kill for Ill State.

The box score does shows Izzi with 1 setting error. This may have been it. I think double touches are scored as ball handling errors. Gabi had the only BHE by the Shocks.

Kinda poetic the Shocks hit .316. If they hit the area code the rest of the year, they will win a bunch of games.

Poetic perhaps, but a rhyme that will probably not be duplicated very often this year. The Shocks hit over .300 six times last year and hit .316 or better 3 times. For the season they hit .226. But you are correct. If the Shocks hit .316 for the rest of the season they should win a bunch of games. The Shockers have two seasons when the hit .300 or better as a team for the season.

The first was in 2005 with Andee Hartig and Abby Harsh sharing the duties of setting Elizabeth Meyers (.429) Jen Ray (.385), Darci Vohs (.323) and Sarah Lungren (.327) as that team hit .305 and finished he season 28-3 (18-0 in MVC play).

The second was in 2017 with Emily Heibert setting Abbie Lehman 792 times resulting in 410 kills (.441). Emma Wright hit .310 but on only 242 total attacks. Tabitha Brown and Mikaela Raudseep had the most attacks on that team hitting at .268 and .238. However, Emily herself hit .359 with 148 kills on 312 total attacks to help the cause. That team hit .301 for the season and finished 29-4 (20-0 in AAC play).