Shockers at Illinois State

[flyingMoose]

The Shockers open a series of four road games with this match at Normal with the Redbirds.

In the pre-game, Lambo, well known as a stat head, said that our dig percentage was 52% and ranked in the middle of the conference. Northern Iowa is the best in the league at 56%. Our SA/SE is the lowest in the Valley. Both of these issues are points of emphasis that the Shocks hope to improve.

[flyingMoose]

Set One

Illinois State 25-23 Shockers

A set of runs. With the Shocks leading 8-7, the Redbirds ran out to a 15-9 lead with the Shockers calling two timeouts. From 22-15, the Shocks ran off seven consecutive points to tie the match at 22. The Redbirds scored the next two point and maintained that margin through the ensuing sideouts.

[flyingMoose]

Set Two

Illinois State 22-25 Shockers

After playing a 6-2 in the first set, the Shocks went to a 5-1 in this set. From 6-6, the Shockers eased out to a 15-9 lead, and the Redbirds never got closer than four until the very end. After two sets, the Shocks are hitting .241 v .237. Abbie leads the attack with eight kills.

[flyingMoose]

Set Three

Illinois State 24-26 Shockers

Another set of mini-runs. From 11-11, the Redbirds ran out to leads of 15-11 and 17-12. The Shocks then tied the match at 17. After the Redbirds crept out to a 23-22 lead, the Shockers rallied to take the set.

For the set, the Shocks hit .163 to .140 and .214 to .200 for the match. Again for the match, Shimen has eleven kills while Abbie and Katie have nine.

[flyingMoose]

Set Four

Illinois State 25-19 Shockers

Each team had an early three-point lead followed by a series off one-point leads for each team until the Redbirds took a 19-17 leading to a Shocker timeout. Illinois State then finished off the set. Hitting .100 v .293 in the set won't cut it. The Shocks have far too many hitting errors in this match. The crowd is building as the fans arrive for the equivalent of Shocker Madness, a help for the Redbirds in the fifth set.

[The Mad Hatter]

Down 12-14 in the 5th, the Shocks win 5 of the next 6 points to win set 5 by a score of 17-15 and the match 3-2.

[flyingMoose]

Set Five

Illinois State 15-17 Shockers

A nip-and-tuck set that typified the match. The Redbirds got the first late, two-point lead at 12-10. They proceeded sideout to serve for the match at 14-12 before the Shocks scored three in a row to serve for the match themselves at 15-14. After being tied at 15, Katie and Jody had kills to take the match, 3-2.

We hit .224 to .246 and were outblocked 12 to 8.5. The Shocks had an error percentage of 15% (too high - 12% is nice) and the Redbirds had a percentage of 9%.

Jody had 19 kills (and 24 digs), Shimen had 14, Mikaela and Abbie had 12 and Katie had 11.


Post-game comments

Game balls to Jody and Emily - and Dani, a late mention.

Lambo thought the Shocks were flat, not competitive. He mentioned there were team issues during the week - take care of your teammates, go to class, (another item mentioned) - and those things can carry over. He thought the Redbirds had too many blocks caused by our attack selection being poor.


It was a win, but he definitely did not sound happy.

[IAmWu]

Listened to the postgame show with Lambo and he did not seem happy with the team tonight. Talked about some problems off the court (at home, taking care of business in class and with teammates), which was a little interesting. Upset with how often we were blocked tonight. Was happy for Jody as she played pretty well tonight.

[WuDrWu]

Not exactly something you've heard much in 15 years.

Illinois State's senior and 3 time all conference OH Ashley Rosch went 20-0-77 with 4 blocks, 2 assists, 1 ace and 15 digs. ZERO flipping errors in 77 swings. That's unreal.

[flyingMoose]

Other Friday Scores

Indiana State 2-3 Missouri State
(20), 14, 23, (19), 11

Evansville 0-3 Northern Iowa
13, 13, 12

Southern Illinois 3-0 Drake
15, 18, 20

[WuDrWu]

Kind of a rough day for me and I missed the early start....did we scrap the 6-2 apparently? Any idea or thoughts why?

[WuDrWu]

The next 3 matches will go a long way to determining how this team finishes. 8-1 through the first half, but 5 of those 9 could have gone either way. Heck, they faced match point in the last 2. Easily the ladies could be sitting at 6-3 and a match behind Loyola.

Plus UNI is a different team right now.

At Indiana State tomorrow, at Missouri State next Saturday then at SIU 2 days later. 3-0 and they'll be starting to engrave our name in the trophy. 2-1 would be good as well and put the pressure on one of the other 5 to get hot. 1-2 or 0-3 and it's wide open.

4 of the last 6 are at home, and one of the 2 road games is at 0fer Bradley. Sets up good coming home if they can be strong the next 10 days.

[flyingMoose]

Kind of a rough day for me and I missed the early start....did we scrap the 6-2 apparently? Any idea or thoughts why?

We played the 6-2 in the first set and then scrapped it. Mackenzie came in for an isolated rotation as a setter in the third and (two rotations?) fourth sets. No mention in the post-game of the reasoning behind the change.

[ShockerFever]

Always nice to see a win over the Redturds. Illinois State continues to be Wichita State's b*tch.

Nice late comeback ladies. Well done.

[WuDrWu]

The Redbird fans arriving for the basketball scrimmage naturally got into the match, sensing a chance to knock off the big dog. It had to be satisfying for the girls to shut up the bandies with that closing thrust.