Houston Thread

BeckysTXA · #1 09-02-2011, 10:01 AM

I'll probably be a little late to this party (match). Tower #3 starts her season at 4 pm, so gotta watch her Division II match.

UD needs to come out strong and fast against this very good Houston team. I think they are pretty physical, probably more so than we are. Megan and Kray will have to work hard to balance that part of the game out. And our younger players will have to play with no fear against Houston's power.

Based on UDBrian's interview with Sheff, it sounds like Megan will be going 6 rotations and Rachel Jones will tag-team Brigid Campbell and play about 3 rotations in the back row. That means Kray, Paige, Ally, Megan and Rachel will be holding down court in the passing and serve recieve deartments -- toughest tasks in this game. All need to have a good day at the office to win this match.

UDBrian · #2 09-02-2011, 04:51 PM

The team needs to serve well and return serve well to win this match. But, that is the case when you play good teams. Most good teams will hammer you if you just hit the ball over the net and allow them to run their offense.

UDBrian · #3 09-02-2011, 05:42 PM

Rachel Jones getting her first career start today. Tear them up Rachel. Houston is very tough but if Tennessee gets their injured players back this could be our best shot at victory over the weekend.

UDBrian · #4 09-02-2011, 05:50 PM

Off to a great start. 18-11 and we are hitting .400. Houston is hitting about .100.

UDBrian · #5 09-02-2011, 06:14 PM

Rachel Krabacher is really carrying the team right now, she has 12 kills less than half way through set 2. Megan Campbell is second with five.

BeckysTXA · #6 09-02-2011, 06:20 PM

Well I just got done with a 5 set win for Tower #3's team over in Division II. And I got nothing on video or Gametracker for UD's match. Anyone got anything now? Saw on twitter UD won the first set with Kray leading the way.

I'll keep trying. lol

UDBrian · #7 09-02-2011, 06:23 PM

gametracker is screwed up. When you come to the gametracker screen look at the top where scores are listed. Find the ud game and then click on that game to start gametracker and it will work.

BeckysTXA · #8 09-02-2011, 06:31 PM

And now it looks like Gametracker is locked up with Dayton up 24-19 in the 2nd set. So either it's locked or Dayon won Set 2 @ 25-19 and whoever is running GT didn't put in the final point stat info. I noticed there are lots of error in the play-by-play info. That's a shame because that means the stats for these girls who work very hard will be wrong. For example they have Brigid serving and UD wins the point and them they switch over to Kray serving. So it was probably Kray all along. It's a mess for sure -- that's just one example.

BeckysTXA · #9 09-02-2011, 06:33 PM

twitter just updated -- UD in fact wins set 2 with the same score as Set 1 == 25-19.

We need to close this out in a sweep --- which would be very impressive with Yvonne out. Honestly, I was a little worried. GO FLYERS!!!! Prove me wrong!!!! I'll love it.

UDBrian · #10 09-02-2011, 06:38 PM

At the end of two sets it is the Rachel and Megan show right now. Rachel with 15 kills and Megan with 8 kills. The rest of the team has a total of five kills

UDBrian · #11 09-02-2011, 07:07 PM

The Flyers win set 3 25-22. Rachel K was carrying the team early when she had eight kills in game one and was hitting .400. Her hitting percentage dropped way down to .135 as the match progressed. I am guessing that they put a double block on Rachel and dared someone else to beat them.

Megan Campbell was a beast again as she recorded 14 kills while hitting .435.

Our serving helped us in this match

BeckysTXA · #12 09-02-2011, 07:08 PM

UD wins set 3 25-22 -- and sweeps Houston. Impressive win. All the freshmen contributed. Looks like Z got her swing going with Sam hitting .380+ and I think lead the team with 3 blocks. Those are big numbers for a freshman. Rachel Jones had 7 digs, playing 3 or so rotations.

Kray was a warrior. I didn't see the match, but she took over 50 swings in 3 sets. Her hitting percent wasn't great, but understand she is going to get the bulk of the out-of-system sets which can be down right terrible at times and result in hitting errors more than anyone else on the court. Megan also got a lot of swings out of the middle -- around 30. That's a lot for an MB -- and she scored often -- hitting over .400.

This is a nice win. It should give the girls a bunch of confidence that they can beat Tennessee tomorrow morning.

GREAT JOB!!

Avid Flyer · #13 09-02-2011, 07:39 PM

Great win ladies.

This is so bizarre I'm sitting in U of Houston cafeteria having dinner. Darn don't have me Dayton hat.

Fan4allUDSports · #14 09-02-2011, 10:40 PM

This is a GREAT start for the ladies. Keep it up gals.

UDBrian · #15 09-03-2011, 02:24 AM

I agree this was a nice win with a young team.

Sam Selsky played a good match. She had 35 assists (almost 12 per game), seven digs. I also like the fact that Isolde came through in set 3 when we really needed some offense and also provided a couple of blocks.

We had seven block assists for the match which makes a person think that our blocking was not good. But, Houston only hit .075 for the match with 20 hitting errors. That makes you think that the block was there and they hit out of bounds, around or over the blocks. It is hard to know without watching the match.

Tennessee could be really tough. Sheff said that they have had some injuries but might have some people back. He probably knows more about who will be playing now. That will be another good test without Yvonne. It is a winnable match imho.

BeckysTXA · #16 09-03-2011, 09:53 AM

I agree UDBrian -- sometimes you simply have no chance to get a block because the other team "blinks" when you have the block set and hits a hit floater or tries to hard to hit around the block and hits out.

Tennessee -- gave #7 Illinois a tough match before losing 1-3. Set scores tell a lot: 31-29, 25-23, 23-25, 25-19.

This is probably our first big challenge of the season. Tennessee was a ranked team in pre-season, goes 3-0 last weekend, but drops into the receiving votes (#26) category because Oregon upset #1 Penn State and moved into the Top 25.

Tennessee is a very good volleyball team. Great test for our young team. I cross-checked TN's stats from last weekend against the Illinois match last night and it didn't appear that any of the injuryed players were back. Doesn't mean they won't be today -- for what it's worth.

udisit19 · #17 09-03-2011, 11:44 AM

I was unable to watch the 3rd set of this match, but did catch the first 2 sets. After what Houston did to xavier last weekend I thought this would be a very tough match. But are passing looked good. Very to impressive to get a straight sets win against this Houston team that probably will challenge for a C-USA title without our only Senior Yvonne Marten.

I stopped on the volleytalk website to read about the UCF upset over USC and numerous posters mentioned how they thought the loss may be because the team was playing without Falyn Fonoimoana since she was ruled ineligible for the season. Nice to see our Flyers but this loss of Yvonne to injury aside and just play some good volleyball.

Next 2 matches will be even tougher. Now its time to get a few things done before the match gets under way.