Final NACWAA thoughts

[vballmaniac40]

My NACWAA thoughts:

USC: Wasn't impressed with setting or Alicia Robinson. I say Mick gives Florian a chance. Also, Emily Adams is way overrated. On the other hand, Burdine and Candelas were great and will be all season. Their libero was a huge surprise, she did a very nice job.

Minnesota: They exceeded my wildest expectations. Everyone played well. Martin and Gentil were both playing like the All-Americans they will be this season. Also, Kelly Bowman was spectacular and Nelson imporved so much. Her athleticism is so apparant in everything she does on the court.

Colorado St.: Not overrated. Everyone on this team SMASHES the ball. They're also lead by a great setter. They could finish the season deep into the tourney. Tess Rogers impressed me most, what a leaper.

Georgia Tech: I think they're in trouble. It's a good thing they play in a weak conference. Sauer is not that good and their setter was embarrassing to watch at times. Hopefully things start clicking between her and the good potential hitters this team has. Their backrow was decent and that can carry you a ways.

[kurtinatlanta]

I was more impressed with Dre Downs for CSU.

Minnesota was interesting. They were absolutely awful in their first game, and for the early part of game 2, but then someone turned on a light switch and they beat CSU then nearly beat USC.

Lindsey Laband wasn't awful. She had her share of bad sets, but some of the passes she had to deal with weren't very good. Giving 16 points to CSU on service errors, however, was awful and might have been the difference in the match.

[JT]

NACWAA champs and runner-up








With a bit of luck, I'll have more pics (and larger versions of these, for any who want to make a print of them) in the next day or so, online at the Golddiggers Booster Club website. ( golddigger.umn.edu )

[roofed!]

I have just got back from Denver. I would say that USC will have the work cut out for them to be in Long Beach in December. As I have expected, two issues confront this team -- setting and Alicia Robinson. Both Freeburg and Dillon were okay, nothing spectacular or rock-steady like Toni Anderson. In fact, I like Minnesota's setters better. This year, USC's offense is way too slow, and somewhat predicatable with many sets going to outside. Candelas and Adams did not get many great sets, and often they had to tip the balls over instead of slamming them down. Both Freeburg and Dillon were not setting the balls high enough for the tall MBs to utilize their height advantage. Adams, especially, was struggling with the sets coming her way. I was partially surprised to see Robinson being the other OH. Many aspects of her game remain suspect especially passing and digging, and with bad sets coming her way, she also struggled with her hitting form. Against GTech, Haley used Florian for the last half of 3rd set, and I would say that she has better ball control. You can see that Minnesota was targeting their serves to Robinson almost all night long. I would like to see Florian being used more often in the coming matches.

Burdine also struggled with the sets coming her way. It seemed that the go-to-player this year would be Candelas. Often when USC was stuck in a rotation and needed to break Minnesota's run of points, Haley would use Candelas to hit from all three positions - outside, middle and opposite. Being tall and having extensive international experience, Candelas was the best player to adjust her game.

Also, with both setters struggling to give sweet sets to their hitters, USC started real slow, and it took them almost two games to settle down and get their system going (even against GTech, USC was struggling in the first game). In fact, when the championship match went to 5th set, I almost conceded it to Minnesota, but was pleasantly surprised to see USC jumping to a quick lead.

I like what Minnesota is doing with its team. I am especially impressed with Kelly Bowman. As she (and Taatjes) improves her hitting, the loss of Busse will be minimized. I especially like Bowman's demeanor on court as she was very focused and in control (sort of reminded me of Toni Anderson, but of course, Anderson did not hit on front row). We can expect great things from Bowman as she improves her game.

[SakiBomb25]

Did the other Trojan setter start? I forgot her name, but the JUCO setter... I almost expected her to start over Freeburg. She wasn't injured or anything, was she? For USC's sake, I hope Haley goes back to a 5-1 and uses Dillon exclusively because I am still not convinced that Freeburg can get it done at the Division I level. Maybe she'll prove me wrong in the coming weeks, but I just don't know about her.

Right now, it would seem that the favorite has shifted to Nebraska, just based on Pavan and Stalls. However, if ball control and setting becomes issues... who knows with this season. Maybe Stanford could slip into the Final Four with their lack of experience in the middle. I hear that Franci Girard is doing really well in practice and I expect her and Suiter to be the ones to man the middle come September 3rd.

[roofed!]

Nevena played in the last half of the 3rd set against G Tech. She was not spectacular either. At this point, I would say that she is third on the depth chart behind Freeburg and Dillon. Below is my impressions of the USC setters.

I would say that Freeburg and Dillon are almost equal. Neither one is that far ahead of the other. Dillon comes in at an opportune time, and able to fight her way to become the starter setter in the modified 6-2 offense (as oppose to Minnesota which is running the true 6-2 offense). I like her serves, and she was able to start several points runs behind her serves. One thing that I would like her to improve is for her to jump-set. Her setting rhythm was pretty slow as she remained rooted to the floor while setting, and you can pretty guess where the ball was heading. Freeburg has improved somewhat from last year (of course, last year, Toni Anderson was way, way, waaayyyy ahead of her). If Haley runs a 5-1, I think he would go with Freeburg. There were once against G Tech and about 2-3 times against Minnesota when USC was almost running out of substitutions, and Haley let Freeburg rotated to the front row and Copenhagen (who has better ball control than Venski) to the back.

The big issue related to USC setting was the passing. Alicia Robinson was a target on serve receive, and there were couple of times when she sent to balls over the net for easy kills from the Gophers. Robinson seemed to have a peculiar fond of taking serve receive overhead, and she does not have sweet hands. At this point, I would say bring Florian in. You have to have the passing in order for the offensive game to kick in. Even Copenhagen has better serve receptions. Or for USC to have a 2-woman serve reception with Seilhamer and Burdine. And we have not seen the bazooka jump serves coming into Robinson yet! As I have stated above, Robinson is also having problems in backrow digging.

As I have stated earlier, USC has its work cut out for them in order to be in Long Beach to defend its title. Another area that concerns me is their serving. There was no jump server! I would have like Candelas to revert to her jump serving, to cause problems to opponents' serve receive.

[Gorf]

roofed! said:

Also, with both setters struggling to give sweet sets to their hitters, USC started real slow, and it took them almost two games to settle down and get their system going (even against GTech, USC was struggling in the first game). In fact, when the championship match went to 5th set, I almost conceded it to Minnesota, but was pleasantly surprised to see USC jumping to a quick lead.

I like what I've heard regarding the Gopher's from their NACWAA matches this past weekend.

It would have been nice for them if Tree Bratford had been able to play in the 5th game. It could perhaps turned into one of those 21-19 (or some such) overtime thriller 5th game matches.

Hopefully Tree's injury isn't something that will keep her off the court for an extended period of time or one that will impact her mobility / jumping for the rest of the season.

I don't know if either USC or Minnesota will make it to the final four again this year, but if both teams can stay healthy and continue improving throughout the season who knows.

Its unfortunate that none of the NACWAA matches were televised.

[Boom]

roofed! said:

Both Freeburg and Dillon were not setting the balls high enough for the tall MBs to utilize their height advantage. Adams, especially, was struggling with the sets coming her way.

I only saw the final, but I'm not sure about the height of the sets. I thought they were trying to run 0 tempo, which is hard no matter what, but more difficult when the hitters are so much taller than the setters. It looked awkward - almost ugly - at times.

Minnesota was fun to watch. Looks like Gentil's amazing plays are rubbing off on the team and others are doing similar feats of defensive daring - great coverage and amazing pursuit.

[roofed!]

Boom said:

Minnesota was fun to watch. Looks like Gentil's amazing plays are rubbing off on the team and others are doing similar feats of defensive daring - great coverage and amazing pursuit.

Minnesota's defense was very fun to watch. During the match against CSU, Gentil chased the ball into the stands....jumping over the team bench, and keeping it in play! It was spectacular and I was glad that she did not injure herself or something like that. During the match against USC, Herbert stood up about 2 times to stop Gential and Reinhart from chasing the balls into the stand, obviously aware of the risk of injury.

[Deleted]

sweetspot said:

I felt the much bigger issue is the USC passing which must get better. Once the passing gets better, the USC offense will become much more consistent. Freeburg also gives the Trojans good defense. She picked up 15 digs in the final match which was much more than any setter in the tournament.

First of all, I don't think people (not specifically sweetspot) are giving Minnesota's defense enough credit. I'm not taking offense or anything, don't get me wrong. But USC was BANGING the ball Saturday night. The Gophers just weren't letting anything hit the floor.

Secondly, Freeburg's 15 digs were not the most by a setter. Taatjes had 15 against USC (and 13 against CSU). Kelly Bowman had 18 both nights. (Ali Dillon, BTW, only had 6 v. Minnesota.

[Boom]

While I did not think that USC hit hard consistently, I do give HUGE kudos to the UM defense. Gentil is what the libero is all about --- I wasn't event sure what defensive position she was playing, I could swear she just takes over and the rest of the team rotates depending on her position. And they were fabulous at pursuit of balls dug off the court -- there was no quit in their defense.

Still, I was not impressed with the USC power overall. Lots of crazy angles due to the high contact point, but the hardest hits were, IMHO, the UM players.

I am now a UM fan... unless they are playing Utah or the MWC

[Deleted]

More fun with stats.

Real point scores for the USC match:

15-10, 14-16, 11-7, 10-11, 3-6 (Gopher scores first)

Games 3 and 4 were particularly well-played, as the scores indicate. It means both were siding-out well. I HATE one point games. 10-11 reeks.

Minnesota real point scores by rotation (I can't use the normal 1 through 6 because of the 6-2):

Bratford (Peniata or Reinhart mostly serving) 7-17 (ouch!)
Byrnes (Gentil serving) 17-4
Bowman 9-11
Martin (Reinhart or Peniata serving) 6-5
Nelson (JBowman served once for her) 5-7
Taatjes 2-4

I list the offensive players so you know who is in the front row. That was the service rotation, although Gentil served first when USC had first serve.

Mick never changed his rotation, except Dillon served first when they had first serve:

Burdine
Adams
Venski/Freeburg (Freeburg serving)
Robinson
Candelas
Dillon/Copenhagen (Dillon serving most, but Copenhagen did serve once)

What jumps out at me? Gophers were giving up points in Bratford's rotation (with Byrnes/Bowman/Martin) in the front row. Interestingly, it was 3-12 in the two games Reinhart was serving. But also interestingly, it was 10-0 in the two games Reinhart served for Martin. (I have some theories about this.)

17-4 with Gentil serving!

The Gophers scored TWO points on Lindsey Taatjes's serve, FOUR for the entire weekend. But they only gave up FOUR points to USC. My conclusion? Lindsey needs to serve tougher and Bratford/Byrnes/Bowman is a terrific side-out trio (with Taatjes setting them).

USC scored 14 points with Burdine/Adams/Venski in the front row and Dillon serving. Their best rotation, by far.

+++

USC has wheels on their backpacks. Give me a break!

[blogger]

So who won? I would read this thread but I'm kinda lazy...

[sweetspot]

Being a die hard Trojan fan like I have been for the last ten years, I have come to realize that passing and defense will determine whether or not the Trojans will three-pete. I thought the Trojans were very slow in the back-court and the passing was very inconsistent. Freeburg is strong enough to make something out of average passing, but Dillon has trouble. Dillon is great when the ball is passed inside the ten foot line, but has to gain strenght to set consisntently to the outside attackers especially the way Mick wants the ball set so high. I think once we get Jessica back, the ball control and defense will get better.

[silversurfer]

I think both setters for the Trojans will come into their own as the season progresses. This was definitely a baptism by fire, and considering, they came out OK. It's not like they won't continue to improve.

Robinson will definitely continue to be a target on serve receive, and I wouldn't think she'll be in the passing pattern much longer. But Florian won't start before a healthy Gysin.

I think it makes sense that Minnesota would be smoother and more organized at this point in the year after the Trojans lost Ross, Davis, etc.