Ohio Match

[BeckysTXA]

Good test today. Ohio had a great season right up until they got knocked off in their conference tournament. I don't think we will take an RPI #44 team lightly. And they will be a test to see how far this team has come this year. Certainly not a must-win, but I doubt the team will be looking at it that way. I think the coaching staff will have them in a "tournament" mind set.

GO FLYERS!!!!

[BeckysTXA]

Flyers up 2-0 at intermission. Will be impressive if we close this out in 3

[BeckysTXA]

Ohio wins 3rd easy and are leading big in the 4th. Looks like we are going to 5. Great test but it's gut check time. Go flyers

[UD62]

Nice comeback in 5th.

[jack72]

Great win for the ladies. What a comeback season for the program. Thank the Lord we got our coach back!

[BeckysTXA]

Us wins 15-9 in 5 th. great tuneup for ncaas. And biggest win of the year so far. Just knocked off a top 50 team who needed this for a shot at an at-large bid. Flyers found a way to regroup and win in 5.

[Chris R]

I think what Becky means is it was the most impressive win of the year.

I think we're still in agreement the A10 Finals win to get to the NCAAs was the biggest since it had more riding on it. Im just messing with you Becky -- we're thinking and saying the same thing. Ohio U is significantly better than anyone we've beaten this year. They blitzed the MAC this year and had the MAC Player of the Year. Ohio U is always tough. While it looked smooth sailing early on, we knew Ohio U wasnt gonna roll over. This one smelled like a 5-setter all the way.

After dropping sets 3 and 4 however and not looking too good doing it, that's a real gut-check to come back and get the fifth after not playing your best. Its just not easy to do to re-light the burner and get the momentum back.

Ohio U was NCAA at-large bubble territory going into tonight. They really needed to win to keep their chances alive they were one of the "first teams out". This loss might keep them out.

We've come a LONG way since the beginning of the year. As I said this match was important b/c it was a measuring stick to really see if we improved after the Pitt and Charlotte losses and could come back and beat teams like that if given a second chance later in the year. We just did.

We're still going to be underdogs in the NCAAs, but right now we're playing our best ball. Thats all you can hope for.

Well done.

[ud69]

Entertaining match. Really strong first 2 sets. Krafka was digging everything. Had the setter dink (tried a lot early) well scouted and well handled. Hitting and blocking was good. In spite of how well we were playing, thought Emmenecker missed a few sets. One in particular I remember - a set for Turner at the left pin, Turner goes for the kill but the set is too high and too wide and over her head so she gets all air. As she follows through with her right arm she brings up her left arm and is able to side-arm it over the net. It was like a diver doing a jack-knife in the air. Hack of an athletic play.

The start of the third set was terrible. A couple of bad service receives and a net serve put us down early. Fourth set was bad as well. Got down big and lost our edge.

Came out smokin at the beginning of the 5th set. We raised our play to a higher level. Put the Bobcats away.

Most likely put a nail in the Ohio U NCAA tournament hopes. Tough way to end their season. They ran the table in their conference season, lost in the MAC conference tournament semis after leading 2-0 against Western Michigan, and then lost a 5-setter to us.

Places we might go for our first tournament match - Penn State, Kentucky, Illinois, Wisconsin... Don't know if tonight's win was enough for us to get the 2/3 seed match-up versus the 1/4 seed match-up in the first round. If I had a choice, I vote to go to Kentucky and play Western Kentucky in the first round.

[Chris R]

According to Figgies RPI, we're just outside the Top-50 now at #52.

On a completely unrelated note while looking over his standings, what the heck happened to Notre Dame? They are 6-23 and #201 in the RPI. That's a proud program with a bunch of NCAA and Top-25 rankings over its lifespan. They were pretty good just a couple years ago (we had a good road/neutral win vs the Irish if I remember). ND usually doesnt stand for such poor performance. Isnt Christy Utnage coaching up there as an assistant? Womens VB had to be the worst performing sport at ND this year.

On another completely unrelated note, I gotta think Stanford is the horse to bet on this year. They have played 25 matches vs the Top-50 and have gone 24-1. Thats simply amazing. Of course they are the 29-1 overall and the #1 RPI team. Their schedule dwarfs anyone around them. To put it in perspective Penn State is 29-3 overall and the #8 RPI team. Lets remind ourselves that Penn State has been THE program the last 10 years. Yet they are 6-3 vs the Top-50. In other words, Stanford has played 16 more matches vs the Top-50 than Penn State, and has earned 18 (EIGHTEEN!!!) more wins vs the Top-50 than Penn State this year.

The PAC12 is just loaded. They have 10 teams inside the RPI Top-43. That said, it wouldnt surprise me to see PSU win it again. Once you get to the NCAAs its win or go home and they know how to win the big ones.

[UDBrian]

Great win to close out a tremendous season. I watched Washington play earlier in the year and they were very impressive

[NovaFlyer]

Great write ups, as always from this group. Thoroughly enjoyed the OU match. They are an impressive team and showed that in sets 3 and 4. I think every UD fan was worried about set 5. Couple of those OU kids could serve like jets, fun to watch, great to win.

Would be nice if OU made the tournament because of the season they had. How about Wisc vs UD!

[Figgie123]

A very impressive game by UD and Ohio.

It was fun watching OU's warmups. They were doing cross-court run and dig drills. Hadn't seen that before. They have a 6'4" freshman who didn't play because they had 2 6'2" players.

Ohio played a great game. They were able to get to a lot of balls, and I think it was because they were setup perfectly around their own blocks. So if we went around a block, their receivers were waiting. And they passed extremely well. Their libero was passing '3' balls from the back row almost at will.

From a receiving perspective, I think UD has done an amazing job this last half of the year. I've been looking at that a bit more because it seemed like we couldn't get to balls earlier this year and now we are getting to a lot of them. Last night, we had 2 different scrums and the first one Rachel hit from just outside the backline and it made it into the net. On the second one, Rachel was somewhere near the concession stand (slight exaggeration) and nailed a Willie Mays return over the net. (We lost that point, but it was great to see.)

The first 2 sets were great sets by both teams. Nice volleys and the better team that point won. Then the next 2 sets they just jumped on us. Hard. Nailing the blocks. Nailing the kills into our side. Just took it to us. I was very concerned for the 5th set.

Then the 5th set, we took a few points to lead like 3-1, then went on a run to go up 8-3 at the switch. That was the margin of victory.

Great Ohio contingent. In the 5th set, the upper deck Ohio fans were chanting for their team, and the upper deck UD fans were chanting, while I was trying to hold the ground down low. I tried to over-scream them, not sure how it worked.

Oh, and the referees actually do listen. An Ohio server looked like she foot-faulted (another fan/player's dad maybe saw it too) and I (and he) screamed at the ref that she hit the line. Well, the ref was behind the server, as she was on the far left, and the next serve he was right up on the line. (The main ref apparently motioned him to move over.) It took a bit off her serve the rest of the night.

I feel bad for Ohio. They actually didn't drop much in the RPI like I originally expected them to, but they are definately on the bubble. They only have 1 top-50 win (Ohio State), but the other bubble teams around them have 2-6 wins. I don't have Lipscomb in at 31, but that's for my NCAA prediction thread. (If I do one this year...)

Figgie

[Figgie123]

And Alaina Turner had 30 kills, for her new career high.

(And I didn't post it, but her 24 kills in the A10 finals against GW was a career-high.)

[NovaFlyer]

Originally Posted by Figgie123 And Alaina Turner had 30 kills, for her new career high. (And I didn't post it, but her 24 kills in the A10 finals against GW was a career-high.)

Alaina Turner is a machine. Just love to watch every part of her game.

[Chris R]

Before losing in the MAC semis to Western Michigan and then Dayton on Friday night, Ohio ran the table in the MAC at 16-0 and were only pushed to five sets once in the entire conference season (Miami).

Ohio U's losses this year by RPI rank:

17 Texas A&M
37 Hawaii
44 Arizona State
52 DAYTON ("Postseason")
74 Northwestern
135 Western Michigan (MAC Semis)

Wins over:
31 Ohio State
53 Virginia Tech
77 VCU

So their worst loss heading into the MAC Tournament was to the #77 RPI team. They were probably on the inside of the NCAA bubble at that point. Get to the MAC finals and lose but beat UD and they probably still make it. Exiting the MAC tourney before the finals however and losing to UD may keep them out. Their resume' is still pretty good, but maybe now holding on to fleeting hope.

They beat WMU 3-1 during league play 25-16, 25-20, 21-25, 25-14. With rally scoring this sport can spring surprises from time to time.

[Figgie123]

Luckily for Ohio, Seton Hall and Northern Iowa did not win their tournaments and "steal" a bid. Though, Seton Hall is in the discussion at FiggieRPI 48 with 2 top25s and 4top50s.

Their SOS is also 105, so that's not the best.