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Post by caliente21 on Sept 10, 2007 1:01:23 GMT -5
Weird weekend like so many out there in preseason...made the trip to Notre Dame...Alabama is an incredibly dangerous team...they will do fine in conference, Webster, Fuentez, their stud MH and setter are good. I have seen them in other matches this year, scary athletic, but they played out of their brains v. Ohio for sure. They played very well against Notre Dame too, not as good as Ohio, but bama looked gassed from the night before. Bama played a different lineup, bigger, that was much better than earlier in the season.
To Ohio's credit, they responded and beat a feisty Charleston team in 3 and then took care of Notre Dame in 4 to win the tournament. Notre Dame is really good too, they will make a mark this year.
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Post by OU-OhYeah! on Sept 10, 2007 10:39:34 GMT -5
I thought it was a quality tournament field, although all four teams showed early season bugs. I agree Alabama probably played their "match of the season" (so far) against Ohio. I would say Ohio did the same against Notre Dame yesterday. After back-to-back five gamers, Alabama just did not have any gas left for Charleston. That's not knocking Charleston -- they'll win plenty of matches this year.
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Post by Mr. Wednesday on Sept 10, 2007 15:09:26 GMT -5
My brief observations from the Alabama-ND thread:
ND pooched game 1 (badly) and game 3 (enough to lose). The Irish were strong in game 2, and outplayed in game 4. Game 4 was the only one where Ohio looked like a ranked team. I felt like, after game 3, ND ought to be able to take it to five, but the Bobcats looked really impressive in shutting down game 4.
Additional thoughts here:
I think the biggest shortcoming for ND right now is consistency. When the Irish are playing at their peak, they can play with anybody, but the periods where they're playing at that level are too infrequent to pose a serious threat to good teams.
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Post by caliente21 on Sept 10, 2007 23:10:51 GMT -5
I agree Wednesday...good observations. Most teams other than the top few are still working out lineups. Ohio's starting lineup had a freshman setting(was it her first match?), 3 sophs and 2 seniors...so they are a young team on the court. Notre Dame too I think...not as young as last year but still lots of youth.
IMO Notre Dame will be a legit team and it will be them or Louisville in the Big East. It was a pretty good match overall between two strong teams, Ohio just played tough to end the match.
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Post by ESTRELLA on Sept 11, 2007 8:34:38 GMT -5
I agree Wednesday...good observations. Most teams other than the top few are still working out lineups. Ohio's starting lineup had a freshman setting(was it her first match?), 3 sophs and 2 seniors...so they are a young team on the court. Notre Dame too I think...not as young as last year but still lots of youth. IMO Notre Dame will be a legit team and it will be them or Louisville in the Big East. It was a pretty good match overall between two strong teams, Ohio just played tough to end the match. OHIO is a better team by far. ND just lives on the name from the ghost of the past thanks to FOOTBALL(which they are not a top team anymore). ESTRELLA  |
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Post by OU-OhYeah! on Sept 11, 2007 9:57:31 GMT -5
Ohio's starting lineup had a freshman setting(was it her first match?) It was Michelle Jantsch's second start. She also started the College of Charleston match the day before. |
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Post by southsider on Sept 11, 2007 10:48:49 GMT -5
Where is ND's Kaelin? She's on the roster, but has no stats so far this year. What's up?
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Post by Mr. Wednesday on Sept 11, 2007 16:53:36 GMT -5
Per ND's last couple of pre-match releases, she's out injured and may be back before the end of the season.
I wasn't paying close attention to OU's setting, but I can say that Jantsch's attacks (twice as many as Tarutis over the match per the box score) may have unsettled the ND defense in game 4. Certainly, as I noted previously, OU's offense was really humming in that game.
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Post by Mr. Wednesday on Sept 11, 2007 17:06:04 GMT -5
One other thing about Ohio that I'm not sure I mentioned previously... they have a couple of big serves from their two outside hitters which at times put ND's service reception under a lot of pressure. It's a weapon largely lacking from the Irish arsenal -- ND's only hard serve is Stasiuk's, but for some reason it doesn't seem to get a lot of results against good opponents. I agree Wednesday...good observations. Most teams other than the top few are still working out lineups. Ohio's starting lineup had a freshman setting(was it her first match?), 3 sophs and 2 seniors...so they are a young team on the court. Notre Dame too I think...not as young as last year but still lots of youth. Notre Dame's 5-1 included a senior setter and opposite (Tarutis and Stasiuk), junior middle blocker (Stremick), two sophomore outside hitters (Phillips and Fesl), and a frosh middle blocker and libero (Sciacca and Puente). In the brief flirtations with a 6-2, the senior setter was replaced with a sophomore (Nicholas) and one of the outside hitters was replaced with another sophomore (Enzweiler). Junior OH Mallorie Croal has been out injured, but I don't know how the lineup will change when she returns. Maybe they'll go back to a 6-2, (I'd imagine with Croal replacing Enzweiler), or maybe they'll do something else (play Stasiuk at libero?). |
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