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Post by 5100 on Aug 20, 2008 1:51:52 GMT -5
And yes, Piccinini is gorgeous. Have you seen the video of her, uhhhh, photo sessions? A volleyball statistics sheet isn't the only place where she looks good. Yeah. She's a commercial model and has posed for Maxim-type photo sessions, I believe.
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Post by VolleyTX on Aug 20, 2008 9:58:15 GMT -5
How great was that match! How much fun was it to see how one player (Berg) can completely turn a match around.
The biggest difference was setting the middles. My one complaint about Ah Mow's setting in the past is that when she gets tight, every set goes to Tom and Haneef. I think it was the 2004 match up with Russia that almost every set in the 5th set went to Tom or Haneef.
I loved how Scott and Bown just took over the match offensively. The last year or two, the middles have been hitting a lot more quick sets in the middle of the net rather than the usual Slide. I wonder if this is something JLP pushed for. They certainly didn't hit too many quick middle attacks under Toshi.
Great performance! Thank God for Berg's play off the bench.
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Post by Phaedrus on Aug 20, 2008 10:20:50 GMT -5
It may have been Ah-Mow, but it also could have been Berg doing herself the best favor by staking the USA to such a huge lead.
I think the Italians were afraid of making mistakes and get themselves deeper in the hole, so the attacks were less aggressive and the serving was less aggressive, which enabled the USA passing to get better and enabled Berg to set middles.
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Post by bownlovingfreak on Aug 20, 2008 10:25:03 GMT -5
Berg did play well, but it was fun in the 5th match watching Scott and Bown blast off. Danielle Scott had a part in about 7-8 of the points I believe.
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Post by azvb on Aug 20, 2008 10:34:22 GMT -5
One more thing. Robyn lead by example. Even though she sat out part of the fourth and the fifth, she was leading the team to shake hands after the match, and then stood at the sideline to hug and congratulate every single one of her team mates. I guess there is no heavy drama this year. Sykora, Joines, and Oganna all looked genuinely happy to support the team. Gotta love a team.I noticed that-very cool.
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Post by VolleyTX on Aug 20, 2008 10:36:31 GMT -5
The Italian's were still taking some big swings. I couldn't believe how much their passing fell off. They are usually an excellent receiving team. It did seem like their serving got more conservative as the match wore on.
Even when the US was passing well, Ah Mow was rarely setting the middle. Ah Mow is an EXCELLENT setter. I would still consider her USA's first setter, but I do think she tends to get into patterns where she sets too many balls to the outsides... especially Tom and Haneef (regardless of the quality of the passing).
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Post by sasa on Aug 20, 2008 13:14:45 GMT -5
Time to be fair and congratulate team USA for playing above their heads and winning against a stronger team. I'm not too sure that USA played that good or if the Italians really played that bad. They looked so off and the italians mentally checked out in games 4-5. You can argue that this was because of team USA (they did have great energy- and finally Tom had some focus), but I'm wondering why the italian level dropped off that much. I'm not going to be a fair weather fan here...I think USA loses to Cuba, loses the bronze medal match and then we are back to square one. The way I look at it this is a great view- I will be pleasantly suprised if they win (they have been winning since I brought up how disgusted I was with them) or they will lose and my points become valid again! Teams that can step up and play well when it counts can win- Colorado beat Nebraska not to long ago!! But that doesn't change the fundamental problems of bad passing and unathletic setters, and poor training. It's hard to really enjoy a win like this when you've shot your mouth off like you have isn't it baldy? And now, you want in on the celebration by offering some back handed compliments to the USA team. Then to top it all off, you cast yourself a big safety net so that you can 'enjoy' a victory over Cuba with the rest of us, or gloat over what you think was the problem if we lose. You're quite a team player Judas!
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Post by PukaPants on Aug 20, 2008 13:37:43 GMT -5
baldy suffers from chronic douche-bagosis...
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