Some thoughts about Georgia:
I have not watched Georgia that much this season. This is not intended as some kind of conclusive guide, but merely some of my thoughts heading into the match tonight.
They did not have a particularly robust non conference campaign. They lost to Texas Tech (back when Tech looked pretty good) and were swept by the Fighting Bergmann's, both at home. Their best win at a glance was against NC State.
In conference they went 13-5, going 8-2 in their last 10, including two sweeps of LSU in Baton Rouge. The players and head coach say that was their best outing of the year - not necessarily in how they performed the whole time, but how they responded to adversity within those two matches, including coming back from being down 20-12 in one set.
Their best win by far was sweeping the Gators in Gainesville. I did watch that match.
Here are a few things that stand out about Georgia to me:
- they run a 6-2
- they are one of the best and most balanced serving teams in the country
- Kacie Evans
- their block
Fortin and Brower are their two setters. Brower is a sophomore from the Woodlands, from an athletic family. They are statistically similar with Brower having the edge in assists per set at 5.77 to 4.44 for Fortin.
They have 6 players with over 20 aces on the year. Evans leads the way with 46. They have played 35 sets more than Texas (117 to 82) over the course of the season, so total numbers aren't a good comparison. As a team Georgia very slightly averages more aces per set at 1.79 versus 1.73. Georgia averages more errors at 2.56 compared to 2.12.
Watching them they consistently have great pace on their serves, with a good mix of long and short serves. This is easily a team strength. Possibly THE team strength. Evans gets the headlines from beyond the service line, but I really like watching Norris back there. But all of them are very capable of putting pressure on serve receive. Listen to Zoe!
Evans is a 5'11 6 rotation monster. Her attack percentages are nothing to write home about, but Georgia's typical solution when she struggles is to set her more. She has a powerful arm, as sharp a cut to the right side as you'll see in the NCAA, and will hit the line with frequency. She's dangerous out of the backrow, but I like her at the left pin a lot more. For her height she's a decent blocker. Probably her best attribute is her fiery competitiveness. There's no doubt who is the emotional leader of this squad, and she does wear her emotions on her sleeve.
I should mention Amber Stivrins here as the other left pin. As we know she's the sister of Lauren Stivrins. She's a decent left pin who transferred from Louisville, and is the third leading kill/s on the team after Evans and MB Sophie Fischer. That said it's a big dropoff from Evans 10.2 attacks per set, to Stivrins' and Fischer's at 7.7 and 5.8 respectively. From there it falls off a cliff.
Fischer is their primary blocker at 6'5. She was a teammate of Skinner the last two years at Kentucky, where she saw little playing time. According to Georgia's head coach, she's helped transform the Georgia culture. Coming from a highly successful Wildcat program, because she bought in to what Georgia was doing in the offseason, her teammates chose to buy in as well. She averages 1.57 blocks/s, with a match high of 15 in a 5 set win over South Carolina. Norris is the 2nd MB. She averages .95 blocks per set.
Running the 6-2, Georgia always has a "taller" player at opposite. Harper at 6'2 is an adept blocker, averaging about .9 blocks per set. Froemming, on the other hand, is only 6'. She averages .78.
Georgia as a team averages 2.7 blocks per set, which is outstanding. Texas, by comparison, averages 2.3.
I don't have any thoughts on Georgia's libero, Bailey Cox. In watching them, I don't think floor defense is a particular strength for Georgia, but her publicly available stats seem fine to me.
The biggest weaknesses of Georgia to me is they don't have enough formidable weapons, they rely too heavily on Evans, they're not particularly terminal, and I'm not impressed with their floor defense.
Georgia absolutely has to put pressure with their serve to get these sets to 20, and then they'll have a chance to steal them away. If Texas is able to consistently stay in system they're going to sideout with an incredible efficiency and sweep Georgia convincingly. I don't think that's going to happen, so it will be a matter of Texas closing out effectively enough not to allow Georgia to take sets that Texas thinks should have been their's. But we'll see.
Evans had some nice things to say about how excited she was to get an opportunity to play in Gregory Gym. As a Texas fan I can't help but eat that kind of stuff up. I will say they didn't play in any arena this year that remotely resembles Gregory. They did play in Gainesville, but the place looked half empty and certainly didn't have the kind of energy Gregory has. There could have been extenuating circumstances. Not trying to throw shade on Florida. It's tougher to create that sellout atmosphere when you're playing in a basketball arena with a lot more seats. I'm just saying that regardless of the reasons, Gregory is going to be at a whole 'nuther level.
