Hi volleyball fans and welcome back to volley talk the podcast created for volleyball lovers who want to dig deep into what is going on in
NCAA and international volleyball. I'm your host Sarah pavin
I'm an Olympian beach volleyball world champion former Nebraska corn husker and longtime pro both indoor and on the beach
And I'm Adam Schultz former indoor player international volleyball coach and the show's resident stack guy
We were back to our regularly scheduled programming on the love side of things this week and
PVF mixed things up and had their all-star game on Saturday in Indianapolis
NCAA men's is still in full swing
There were a lot of interesting results that we will touch on shortly
The Champions League quarterfinals are set for women and
Today we're just going to try to close out February with a bang here Adam has a new game for us
You know, he loves to mix it up. We've got several listener questions
My voice might be a little creaky because I called that five setter between UCLA and UCI last night
So if I'm a little
horse
You know why?
but
I
Will say you did a really good job. Thank you so much. It was a lot of fun actually
We've got a lot to get covered don't want to keep you waiting. So let's get started
All right the weekly highlights happenings
Probably less happenings more highlights because today was this week was a calm week
We're just playing volleyball here. Everybody. You know, we love those weeks. You know, we also love the drama probably more than we should
But today is just results. So
for Champions League
Since we've gotten so many requests to touch more on European leagues
The men are still in the playoff phase
So they're trying to determine which teams are still going to be in the quarterfinals, but the women's quarterfinals are set
we've got and
These Polish I'm not going to pronounce the Polish cities the best but I'll try we've got Lodge
Lodz versus Savino del Benis Candici
Vacav Bank is taking on a Fenerbahce
Conigliano is playing rest of
Rest of
And is Aziz Bashi is playing milano
so we've got
Three Turkish teams three Italian teams two Polish teams for the final eight
And how it works is each team plays at home
then they play away
if the
Matches are split they play a golden set
And the winner of the golden set takes all and goes to the semi-finals. So
Those are actually starting this week. So Lodz and
Scandici, Vacav Bank, Fenerbahce their first round of their like back-to-back is actually happening this Wednesday
so
It's on eurovalley.tv
If you want to check those out. All right, NCAA men's side
Long Beach State
State
Is the only unbeaten team left everybody
Because number three UCLA beat number two UC Irvine who was the other unbeaten team. They beat them twice this week
Three zero in Irvine three two in Westwood. We watched both of those
One of them in person one of them in person
Of course this happened the week after I say I think UC Irvine's better than Long Beach State
Of course that happened. I love UC Irvine. I think they're so good. But this week i'm like left
like
Dang it. Yeah, I just said that last week and here we are. I think there were a few things
That were surprising in these matches one is the match where?
UCLA won three zero in Irvine
They all of a sudden just decided that middle was going to be their favorite attack of the year moving forward
After literally never setting them at all
It was almost painful watching Rowan and Thorne trying to connect up until that point like Rowan kept under setting
Thorne like it was too low. So then they just like didn't bother
And then all of a sudden they were like all world
it was
Night and day difference. I think Thorne got 10 kills
15 in the first match like 18 or 17 in the second both career highs
Yeah, it was it was wild to watch and not only that Rowan was forcing the middle on passes near the attack line
It was a complete switch and I don't know
if this was
Game plan specifically against UC Irvine because they have a first-year middle who hasn't played a ton of volleyball
I don't know if this is something they've been working towards knowing they have to run the middle more
I don't know if they listened to our podcast last week. I mean, obviously that was the that tipped the balance, you know
But we have been saying
If UCLA can run their middle
They're going to be a much more dangerous team and not to mention David was back
Didn't play great in UC Irvine, but he's just a presence on the floor and something you have to think about he played better at UCLA yesterday
But if their middles are going
They're very very good watching that match live
Their only weakness when everybody is playing well in my opinion is their reception libero who
needs to find a little more consistency
I think he gave up a bunch of bad aces. I would argue both liberos are their weak spot
They're at the bottom of the MPSF in digs per set. Fair. Like they don't dig much and I agree
Their reception libero Kirche like he gets aced a lot
If you had one player that you could kind of fix it would be Kirche in my opinion. Well
Rumor has it if you guys follow UCLA that miles partain if he gets cleared to play and come back
He is going to be playing libero
From what I saw this past week from UCLA if they continue trending in this direction
They're going to be very very good and on the flip side watching UC Irvine
They looked a little one dimensional to me this week
I didn't think they ran the middles particularly well
I thought that Flexon struggled this week and partially because it looked like they kept under setting him
I do not think their setter played particularly well this week
He struggled to connect with all of the hitters in my opinion and I didn't love his decision making
They still passed really well but UCLA made them seem a little one dimensional
Flexon didn't play particularly well
The middles didn't score their second left side didn't literally did not score like at all
And so you're left with yes an amazing player but you need more than one person scoring points for you
They definitely had trouble connecting their offense this week everybody looked a little out of rhythm
I agree Flexon was getting set inside a lot and in out of system situations like it wasn't good
I mean even watching live it's like Heno was getting set tight then he was getting set low and then it was too
like it was just messy from an offensive perspective and then because like you were saying before
because UCLA was running their middle so much I think it really highlighted a how undersized UCI's middles are
They're both 164 166 and granted Cam Thorne is 64 for UCLA too but he touches like 1110
So like not really undersized freak athlete and then it also highlighted in particular Micah Goss his inexperience
He just didn't know what to do he could not figure out how to block Thorne what like offensively he did okay
But like he looked a little overwhelmed and then on top of that you see Heno getting frustrated because he's not getting set properly
Like Flexon is having trouble getting going and let me tell you he was ABCA national player of the week this week
It is hard to replicate great performances after getting that title yeah he did not have a good week
I'm not ready to write off UC Irvine like obviously they're still a good team they have great players
But it was just an interesting shift in perception for me between those two teams kind of highlighting
What UCLA can look like when everything is clicking but also what UCI looks like when things aren't going well for them
Because they have been very good up until this point of the season so it's interesting
Well in the first game as well Sean McQuiggan who had it was only his second match of the season hit a thousand
I was unbelievable 10 for 10 second UCLA player in history to do that by the way and with a his like a storied program
Like you at UCLA that says a lot he was not effective yesterday he didn't score many points he made errors stuff like that
But the crazy thing is even though he wasn't scoring he kept drawing the middle with him they were respecting him so much
Which opened things up completely like David had one on ones he had no block sometimes like the outsides on the BIC were hitting with no block
And so at one point McQuiggan got pulled and I was shocked because I'm like yes he's not scoring but he is distracting the middles from the other team
Like keep him in there as a decoy David needs to buy him a beer because he had a couple free swings thank you very much situation
I saw David that man coming at me with no block I would run away
Hanna Turtled in one match he put his hands over his head and just I don't blame him
It was I mean Wednesday wasn't a great game like you see I just looked off I think Saturday's game it was a really good game
Mine was the fourth set it was a very good game the fourth set was rough UCLA kind of ran away with it but overall like you didn't see anything glaring like this is really bad
Like it was a good match to watch agreed agreed number eight Grand Canyon had a tough week they lost 3-1 to number 12 Northridge and then they lost 3-0 to Long Beach State
Long Beach State loss probably not unexpected but the CSUN match they probably want that one back they also did lose their coach who just like pieced out this week to go be the associate head coach for the Kansas women's program
Like I'm sorry are you telling me you can't finish out this season you're just going to leave your team high and dry halfway through the season and be like goodbye
That's a really tough blow to the team to the culture to the environment I'm not surprised they lost the game after that happened you you feel abandoned you've worked towards this the whole time
I mean we don't know the situation around it but you got to handle that and leave your team in a good position in my opinion
I feel like from Kansas's side it's like I understand you're in spring season and stuff you want the girls to get to know your coach the coaching staff but like he can't show up in May you know
Yeah like I feel like that's a little unreasonable and then the fact that he just like I again we don't know the details of like his contract his obligations and stuff but on a human level you would think that you would want to see this through with these guys
Particularly the ones that came in were like recruited by you and you're a good program like it's not like he left a program that was struggling or didn't have a chance like yeah the whole situation seems strange to me
So am I shocked that they had these losses no it's probably a huge blow but it still sucks like I kind of feel bad for them honestly
Number 17 McKendree continues to just ruin people's weeks okay they upset Lewis a couple weeks ago then they upset Loyola Chicago this week the victims were number 15 Ohio State they beat them in four and then on Saturday they beat number eight Ball State in five
I want to know when McKendree is going to be a top ten team because they keep winning
Here we are Penn State can't buy a win and they're somehow hanging around in the top 20 still McKendree just keeps knocking off teams left and right and they're like you know what you deserve a solid 17 congratulations like at some point these guys have got to like move up a little further but that's just me
Speaking of Penn State they are still riding that struggle bus everybody they lost to NJIT I don't even know what that is I'm gonna I'm gonna guess it's New Jersey Institute of Technology I just completely made that up but tell me if I'm right or wrong
They lost three straight to these these guys but then they turned around and beat them in for the next day as I said how are they still ranked if they are don't drop out of the top 20 this week I'm punching my computer screen you know what I mean
It's the legacy vote program history well yeah anyway number 20 Princeton lost to Charleston West Virginia 3-1 they did come back and beat them in for the next match again Penn State and Princeton you need to drop out of this list let's bring in some other teams here okay because you just you haven't proven that you deserve to stay there
The top five has stayed pretty consistent for the last few weeks but we're probably going to see a change namely maybe UCLA taking over the number two spot flip-flopping with UC Irvine will Irvine drop more than one spot because of those losses who knows
My instinct is that they'll drop a low Hawaii I think they'll go to four
Oh you know what I think that's a good call yeah I think that's fair they lost two in a row like if they had split they might have been able to hold on to the three spot but or even the two they might have been able to I think if they had gone into UCLA and one in three or four they probably would have stayed at two but to lose both you're going to drop I think overall the top five is going to change we're going to see some change in the top 10 so let's see what happens on Monday this week we had a bit of a change in the normal
love schedule they played more during the week than on the weekend and for our head to head match we saw Atlanta beating Madison in five which was shocking only because Madison won a few sets but they're still in the loss Adam is so nice about everything except when it comes to love Madison and then he just turned savage well I just I'll be honest I looked at their roster and I looked at for bring her going there and I was like oh my gosh I'm going to be a
better to be the coach and I just thought they were going to be better they just have not figured out how to win and I'm I'm shocked quite frankly it was I keep expecting them to turn it around and I keep being surprised I mean I've said it numerous times I had them in my top three preseason and I'm so embarrassed I'm so embarrassed that I said that I'm like come on everybody I didn't mean it for our weekend slash week with
love we had Austin be Houston 3 1 now a little caveat here for anyone who didn't watch the game is that Houston didn't play a ton of their starters they actually won the All-Star weekend so I think they they gave a few players the match off like Amber I G and just Merzik were like the only two I believe something yeah so not surprising that Austin beat them with half their lineup but then we saw Houston go in and beat Omaha
3-0 after that and they played their starters so I wouldn't read too much into that loss they looked pretty good we watched that Omaha match and we'll talk about it later and then the final match we had Austin beat Salt Lake 3 1 so if we look at the updated standings you have Atlanta still won Houston followed by Omaha Austin Salt Lake and Madison bringing up the rear and they're not even close not even close but nobody's close to Atlanta either I don't think yeah
I don't think they're gonna finish the season on top though I think Houston is gonna keep keep good I they I would say Houston's probably my favorite team I would agree with you looking at the PVF we had the All-Star match this week which looked like it went really well there were about 7,000 people there the atmosphere look great the press around it looked good we didn't have a chance to watch the match just because we were watching the men's match
and we know how I feel about All-Star matches they just stressed me out fair enough we did have Charity Luper and Kylie Myrrh added to the rosters last minute Luper replaced Mevra Mena who was injured and they brought in Kylie Myrrh just to give them another libero option at the event team Chandel won which was good to see there was a good turnout there like we said I didn't really understand the the
format though do you did you read that it was like they had to play three sets but then when team Chandel won the first two they only needed eight points to win so the set victories didn't matter it was total points for and against I believe so they just had to get to 58 like why 58 well at that point because they won the first two sets if they got to eight the other team couldn't get to know but it was like 25 20 25
22 like it wasn't crazy yeah I didn't look into it that close okay I was trying to figure it out because I'm like okay at the end of the first two sets it was 50 to 42 8 plus minus I don't know yeah anyway if you know please tell us so that was good for them and I was glad that it went off well this was the first Pro Vago match to be shown on traditional American TV which is a really cool first for the league for our sport even exactly and so congrats to
PVF you know as much as we talk about maybe the level or how they're doing they are continuing to work in a in a good manner and push forward and it's really good to see now we have big news Columbus has had their coming out party they are winning matches and wow we will talk about so we watch them play the Vegas thrill after we saw that they won really okay let's check this out and we'll see you guys in the next video bye bye.
And see what's going on there were the only team we haven't seen play yeah and so it kind of fit that it worked out well we'll talk about them I was pleasantly surprised watching that match but we'll get into that later so Vegas who lost to Columbus is now struggling they were leading the league last week but now they've dropped two in a row both the Columbus and Orlando Omaha has beaten San Diego twice in a row now and San Diego finds themselves in a tailspin
possibly going to drop below Columbus no they are below Columbus already they're tied in record but they have one less point yeah okay because I looked on the I thought I looked on the stats yesterday and they were still last so they've they've dropped okay now Omaha has the top seed at eight and three followed by Orlando Vegas and then Indy Columbus obviously not in last place anymore which I thought they still were just needed two in a row baby they just needed three wins
so we're starting to see some movement in PVF which is what you want to see teams moving in the standings there's a little bit of adjustments teams are kind of starting to settle in I enjoyed watching the PVF this week I'm not gonna lie it's time to dive into our matches of the week our first one is love Omaha versus love Houston my initial impression watching this was it looked a little uninspired
there didn't seem to be a ton of energy on the court it seemed a little flat but I have been known to be a little harsh so why don't you tell me what you think well I think looking at the scores the game looked closer than it actually was watching it on TV you had Houston was in control of that match from the get-go I think they gave up four and five points respectively at the end of both
the first and the second set so even though it ended you know 26 24 25 23 I believe Houston only ever just needed one more side out and for me watching it there was never really any question as to who was gonna win those sets yeah it's true I think at the end of one set it was what like 23 19 or something and at that 26 24 and then the same story I think as you were saying the score of the third set is how the whole
match felt yes I never really felt like Omaha was in the match or threatening to win I thought at the beginning of the season looking at the Omaha roster that they were going to be consistent but they weren't going to beat you and watching them play throughout the season I think they were the team that gelled the fastest out of all of the teams in love and I think they got some early wins and when I
think we kind of talked about being surprised that they were winning matches and how well they were playing and I think you're starting to see them come back down to earth a little bit there was an injury in the middle so Stivrans is now playing middle which is fine she's a great middle but in the position she's in she's not running the slide so she's not quite as effective I think you're seeing Winters struggling to pass a little bit so they're not in system it's just not as clean and
watching them play they're having trouble scoring points now that teams kind of know what to expect from them and Jordan is still their best player in my opinion and she can't be your best offensive player and to her credit watching her play as soon as the defense moves she knows where to put the ball and she can score she's not blowing anybody up but her vision and ability to kind of wait off the defense is allowing her to score that being said I think
for Houston you're starting to see Massimo Barbellini's coaching style settle in Houston is in good position defensively you're starting to see them play the way he wants them to play and finding an offense and finding a defense and I think for me watching their progression you're starting to see his influence on the team and they're starting to become his team I mean Massimo Barbellini's an incredible coach
he has won world championships everything so I think that the way that it really showed itself to me was seeing him blatantly telling his players to tip the ball we noticed it right off the hop like this was for sure a game plan decision but Omaha was not covering the tips well at all and you could see as the game kept going and went in tight moments when there was a timeout he was telling
them to tip and it was landing consistently yeah and I think this to me is where you start seeing some of the coaching experience I think Suzy Fritz that has done a really good job of bringing her team together but Omaha was defending the perimeter of the court which again makes sense because you have Jordan Thompson who's a good perimeter swinger you have Jess Merzik who's a good perimeter swinger like the game plan given the players you're playing against was solid but there was
no adjustment when they were being exploited it's just obvious that Barbellini got ahead of that because like within the first five points they were tipping and it's just like that type of preparation and seeing those trends like he has that experience and I just like I really like how he's running his team so yeah the tip defense from from Omaha was a huge red flag to me like immediately the other thing
you just talked about it a little bit was like I am a Lauren Stearns fan I think she's very good however she needs to be running off of one foot she is not a two-footed middle attacker which is why I really liked her in the role she had for Omaha because as the right side coming in she was able to run that slide even from the right side position but the fact that they're insisting on continuing with the
six-two even though Candelaria Herrera is injured it doesn't really make sense to me I would almost rather that see them run a traditional 5-1 and allow Stearns to do what she's the best at if you look at love Omaha you still have Winters and Drevniak scoring the most points at 13 apiece like they are going to be your point scores but watching them they're not getting the team out of trouble so
even though they're scoring more points than Larson is they don't have somebody who they can just count on to go up and hit a high ball or hit an out of system ball other than Jordan who can kind of move the ball around but again as you start to play against teams that kind of see what you're doing that's going to become harder and harder and I think you're going to see Omaha struggle in these situations and at the same time Winters being served so much that tip defense she looked at a place to me
on some of those balls didn't really pick them up didn't see what was happening it was everybody it was the setters decima it was Jordan when she was front row it was winter like everybody was struggling to pick up these steps so you think that was less of a player decision and more of a game plan decision that they were doing yeah I just don't think that they were expecting it and they didn't make that adjustment I like Drevniak though I think she does swing well and I do like her
out of system but again you could see the Houston game plan shine in just how many blocks they got and I don't know if that was a big difference in the stats but just watching Omaha got blocked a lot so it's interesting that that was the feel of your well no it was it was seven seven so the block totals were even okay those blocks were coming back and you talk about like the out of system hitting I
personally like Drevniak's out of system hitting but and I know I'm not a Winters fan so this might be a hot take but to me it looks like she just closes her eyes and hits it as hard as she can there's not there doesn't seem to be a lot of intention or creativity behind her offense and I think that's a big reason why she gets blocked so hard yeah she's but I think they're asking her to be
their terminal player no it has to be Drevniak for me I think Drevniak has better range I think she sees the game better like but again as as they're running a 6-2 she's not on the floor all the time so who else who else is it gonna be and this is where I think Omaha has to figure out what their identity is gonna be are you sticking with the 6-2 just to stick with it even though you have a middle who's injured are you gonna go back to it are you gonna find a 5-1 like to me depending on
what the injury is and how long Candelari is gonna be out they need to figure out how they're gonna operate on the flip side Houston we talked about their game plan we talked about Barbolini I'm a huge fan they did look a little fatigued particularly Jess Merzik she's young she can handle it but she gets a ton of balls and she's playing every single match they I think they said they played five matches in seven days again
when you're playing that often you have like a one-hour serve and pass and then you play the match like is it incredibly grueling in my opinion no it's harder to practice every single day a couple times a day but she definitely looked fatigued but the thing that Houston is doing well is they don't rely on one player yes they have Jordan Thompson who has been playing very well these last couple weeks she looks like she has found her rhythm and
she was the player of the match she is pretty much unstoppable at this point in the league and she hit 486 on the match she had 23 points so so even though Jess Merzik did look fatigued and not having quite as much lift or power as she normally does they don't need her to be that player all the time because they have Jordan Thompson and Omaha clearly wanted to wear Merzik down they served her short they served her every
ball and it looked like she was able to just focus in I'm gonna take care of these balls and I know I don't have to carry the load and being able to split your team they have two very good hitters on the outside of the pins with both her and Jordan Thompson Houston doesn't need both of them to be all world to win at any given time which I think is a huge strength and Maddie Rishel is holding her own they don't have to rely on her for a ton of points but she's contributing the one thing I
will say about Houston is I think they need to get their middles a few more balls Jordan Thompson has been able to score against a double block pretty consistently but at some point you want to have a threat in the middle and that would be my guess as to where they go and what they're working on currently I think I G has consistently been getting better as the seasons progress I believe they rested Raffaella fully because we saw Christina Bauer
coming in they didn't use Bauer much but I mean I played against Christina Bauer overseas for years and she was never the offensive middle she was more of the blocking middle but yeah I agree it's nice to see Jordan Thompson kind of like find her rhythm and come into her own again but if Houston can consistently get their middles going to like nobody will stop them I G only got nine sets she's playing I think she's playing well though I agree but they
need to have her be more involved she needs to be more of a threat and so my guess would be that's something that they're going to continue to work on now that they've ironed out the Jordan Thompson consistency correct yeah I think Houston is going to be at the top of the league come the end of the season will they be Atlanta in the final of that tournament last week I yeah watching them for me I think I like how they're training I see them getting better
you can see the purpose of what they're doing they're buying in they're going to be my pick to be at the top of the league coming in at the season our second match of the week is PVF Vegas thrill versus Columbus fury as we mentioned earlier in the show we haven't watched Columbus play yet mostly because they were just losing every single game but after they got their second win of the season versus Vegas we were like we should probably check them out and watch
watching them they were actually pretty good watching that match against Vegas I was shocked that they didn't have any wins yet or very few wins yeah did you do research into what has been happening with them yeah so I looked at I was mostly curious about their roster composition in terms of who's been playing sets while they're losing and so here's here's just a little background information for those of you who haven't been watching Columbus play so Rappas played
very well in this match against Vegas on the right side I thought she was the reason they won the game she was she was on I couldn't do anything wrong unbelievable she only hit 196 what on the match she was the best in the world she was she was very good but she had a 37% kill ratio the only reason her numbers are so bad she only made two errors she was blocked seven times oh baby so you know she was going to be terminal and she was swinging
and the play was ending when she was hitting it regardless of who scored it well I think she got blocked three or four times in that set that they lost and because she got set a ton of balls so to me those numbers are a little misleading I mean getting blocked seven times is a lot I don't think there's anything misleading about that but it happened my point was it happened in one set I understand okay so she's only if we look at the matches that they've lost she started about half
of those matches so it looks to me like they were trying to figure out who was going to be playing Lewis was their other opposite okay so it looked like they were trying to figure out what was going to happen there and that also happened with the setter position so you had Rivera has started all of the matches they won but she's only played again close to half of the matches or started half the matches as their other setter stringer I was actually wondering about that I was surprised
to see court Tori Stringer on the bench she only came in for a few points yeah that explains it I didn't know that so basically Cox and lush who are the outside hitters have played almost all of their matches so they've been staples on the floor with Terry coming in and rotating through so they're pretty set on the left side position but it looks like the coach tinkers based off how that's going but Terry was the one
playing correct against Vegas so this will be really interesting so it looks like they're kind of set there but they're rotating between those three their middles have been solid Rammelsberg and Walker have pretty much played the whole season so they're locked in there but to me it's that opposite setter combination that they're trying to figure out and for all of their wins Rippach and Rivera have been playing so I think you're going to see
that lineup stick together and I think you're going to see them perform much better moving on in the season they're my dark horse team I really liked watching Rivera set I think her release is good I think she was consistent I really liked her decision making watching them for the first time I don't think there was a comparison between setters I mean I didn't see I haven't watched Columbus at all this year and I haven't seen the stringer play enough recently to really be able to comment on that
but interesting two former Louisville setters I was looking at that too I mean we've seen different teams kind of tinkering with their lineup I think certain teams obviously found their lineup quicker than others Columbus seems to be a little slower in figuring that out but I think now maybe they've kind of settled on something and hopefully we'll see them win a few more games they've now been Grand Rapids twice and Vegas once so
hopefully they will continue but going back to the actual game they looked good they looked solid I when we were watching was like wow Raina Terry's making a ton of errors but then you were like no she's not your I thought Raina Terry was playing better than she was your instinct on this was actually right she made I'm shocked she made seven errors and hit 143 but I thought she was attacking
well like she looked in rhythm it looked like she was scoring points for them but the numbers didn't back up my eye test on this one Wow I'm always wrong on this I'm shocked they ran their middle consistently I think Rivera and Walker had a really good connection she was scoring a lot of points Rammelsberg her serving I think at one point she had four aces in a row to close out a set yeah Megan lush she's definitely the veteran on that team she was consistent
she you know did her job she held down the fort so to speak she wasn't like outstanding to me but she was just like steady which I think when you have a team that's having trouble finding wins you just need some players that are just that steady piece so the thing for me that was interesting I was curious if this win for them their outside hitters played significantly better than they had on average in the season like was this an anomaly
I did check that oh you did yeah so that's that was kind of my question going in it's like okay is this an anomaly for Columbus like that they just play way better than they ever have and are they gonna come back down to earth and that's actually not the case so lush played a little bit better than she has historically on the season on the season she's hit 136 and in this match she hit 267 so she could that be a setting thing who knows it definitely could be but she played significantly better
than she has from an attack because I'm like she was fine she was just well I mean 179 is not really where you want to be like 267 is good now Rappas played pretty much the same as she's played all season so she's 179 on the season and she hit 196 in this match so close and again we talked about the blocks but I thought that she was the
dark plug for them and I didn't think they would they win that match without her no Terry actually played worse than her season stats so on the season she's 163 and in that match she hit 143 so she was a little bit worse but they're all kind of within that range so I don't think their performance numbers are actually terrible yeah they're not great but they've been losing right that but that was well I think that is like here we are like oh Columbus isn't that bad maybe Vegas was like
that bad well but continue here's here's the difference so their middles played significantly better than they've played all season so Rammelsberg hits 277 on the season she hit 438 on this one and Walker hits 258 on the season she hit 412 and they got set 16 and 17 times so they made a push to run the middle and their middles played well they're proving what Adam and I preach we give
in and week out if your middle is running well you're gonna be fine so to me that's gonna be their kind of golden ticket to a few more wins as the season progresses and I'm hoping watching that match they stick with Rivera I thought she did a good job running the middle like I said I liked her decisions if they can continue finding a combination between their left sides of who's
playing well and I mean Rappas at one nine or 179 under 200 but she doesn't have to be a world beater and they can still win and you know maybe she won't get blocked quite so many times but I think that they have the makeup of a team that should be winning more matches than they have up to this point and I would expect them to do that moving forward it's just crazy what their season numbers are I know they've lost a lot so like whatever but even the game that they won like their numbers are not good for their
sides and it's crazy that I'm sitting here like oh they looked pretty good like I was I was surprised they look solid it's like that's still not a good performance but your middles held you together well and I think part of it is about expectation right they haven't won anything there at the bottom of the league you expect them to be terrible given their record and that and that was just not the case now curious how their setting has been previous to this but that was good
in this match and I will say Vegas struggled to pass I was just gonna say that wow Alicia Childress was literally trying to run everywhere she could not get to these balls the passes were spraying all over the court she was more track athlete than setter she was on the ground a lot yeah it was it was hard to like I felt bad I felt so bad for her I'm like she did not sign up for this everybody no congrats to Columbus for applying service pressure
and being able to pull that out I'm curious if their serving isn't quite that good like what does what does that look like yeah you saw we were talking about Columbus trying to find what works you saw Vegas trying anything to figure out what would work in this match so I mean they started with Hannah Maddox she got yanked pretty early and Allison Mayfield was subbed in they started with Morgan Stout in the middle she got yanked early Lane Van Busker got put in Teagan DeFalco got subbed in
they were just doing like in and out trying to find something that would work obviously from the passing standpoint with their left side in the barrel but even in the middle like they were desperate yeah and you can't if you're passing like that your middles are gonna be ineffective and not get set which was definitely the case they relied on charity Looper and Cameron Hannah to try and win that match for them and they played pretty well Looper hit
229 on 35 attacks and Hannah was 200 on 35 but let me tell you they were facing a double block almost all night you knew where the ball they were not getting set it was it was tough and other than that they didn't set many other people both Cameron Hannah and charity Looper both got 35 sets and the middles were sitting at 12 and 15 so I mean what are you gonna do you're you're relying on two players with bad passes and not great
sets because she couldn't get to those passes it just yeah it was not the Vegas that we have seen of late they did have that hiatus because they had had so many more games than everybody else they kind of had almost a full week off without games again is that an excuse absolutely not but they did not look as sharp as they have in the past so for me happy to see Columbus
get a win you loved you love a win definitely thought watching that match in isolation that they were good enough to get other wins so we'll see if that keeps going I hope that they stick with this lineup I think it has potential for them I'm expecting Vegas to get back on the right side of things if they can pass
Childress is obviously a great setter she knows what she's doing so once that happens I'm curious to see Columbus continue I think they're gonna win more matches than they have to this point and I would expect Vegas to be fighting for the top of the league still all right so now it's time for my favorite segment so today I think for me there's been a few things that have happened that have been maybe eyebrow raising or have left with questions so we're gonna play something I'm gonna call more surprised so
I'm gonna give you a scenario or two scenarios and you are gonna tell me which one surprises you more and why okay so the first one is are you more surprised that Long Beach State is still undefeated or that UCLA won both matches against UCI today simple the fact that UCLA beat UCI twice I mean Long Beach
State's a great team I'm not shocked that they're undefeated so far but I fully expected UC Irvine to beat UCLA in the second match I have I really really like that team I think that when they're firing and when their offense is clicking they are so good and I'll say it again I said last week I think that when they're
playing well they are better than Long Beach State of course they had to go prove me wrong whatever I'm not bitter about it but maybe a little but I was shocked to see them drop two in a row I would agree with you given who Long Beach was playing now they've beaten some good teams but they've had a couple easier games these last year I schedule has been crazy yeah and I definitely thought that you see I was gonna win at least one if not both of the matches against UCLA especially
given how UCLA has kind of been playing lately so I would agree that the UCLA double win was more surprising for me okay question two and we've talked about this are you more surprised now take yourself back to the beginning of the season that Atlanta is in first place for love with seven wins or Madison is in dead last with one win which of those two things is more surprising
because I going into this season I thought Madison would be at the top I literally thought Atlanta would be at the bottom so both are quite surprising to me I think okay if I logic this out I think the fact that I had Madison in my top three but then Atlanta at the bottom I would have to say I'm more surprised that Atlanta is at the top does that make sense yeah no because I think that
I think the fact that Atlanta is at the top does that make sense yeah no because I didn't have Madison necessarily at the top they're just in that top group so I think the fact that it's Atlanta at the top I'm very surprised when I was looking through their roster at the beginning of the year I'm like no they just don't have it to be fair I thought probably like many people that Katino would be playing right side all season I didn't know who grubs was at all but she has really come into her own and they've like different players have been playing in the same place and it's like I'm just being very kind
that I had no clue who they are have been stepping up which was completely unexpected.
I'm going to go the other way with this. When I looked at Madison's roster and you know
Matt Furbringer has obviously been in the game for a long time has experienced a lot of success.
I thought that combination of coach and team was a lock to be super competitive and for them to be
at the bottom with one win and just not very good I'm shocked at that. You know you look at these
rosters and I think they were created with the intention of being pretty equal and so you know
a couple players stand out like you said a couple people you didn't know play well. I think any team
had the potential to kind of hit the top of the league so for me Madison being as bad as they are
that's a huge surprise to me. Okay the next question we're gonna stay with love here.
Three of the top five point scorers in love are rookies. Are you more surprised that the
rookies have been as good as they are and for those who aren't paying super close attention
it's Madison Skinner, Mirzik and actually Mirzik and Franklin are tied I think as of right now
with 107 points each for fourth best in the league. So are you surprised that the rookies are making
as much noise at the top of those lists as they are or are you more surprised that the other
veterans foreigners that they brought in haven't been making as much of an impact
as you kind of would think they would have at the beginning of the season.
Dang Adam you really did your homework this week these are good questions. Okay when I think about
this the veteran players the foreign players that were brought into love are the ones who are kind
of at the tail end of their career they're kind of on their way out so I I'm more surprised that
the rookies are performing as well as they are. I think there is definitely a jump and some
adjustments to be made going from the college game to the pro game and honestly I thought it would
take them longer than it has to figure it out. I mean are they walking into a1 Italy or to freaking
vacafbank? No I think that would have been a bit of a shock to the system perhaps but I am impressed
very impressed with how they have made the transition. It's not that I expected again I
said that the veteran players like they're on their way out they're not putting up numbers or
like they used to necessarily but yeah I'm gonna go with the rookie angle. I agree with you
on that one I and again it's similar not that I didn't think that those three in particular
wouldn't be good in love in their first season but I think there's a transition to becoming a pro.
I didn't think they would necessarily be relied on quite as much as they have been and you think
that they're playing against better middle blockers more consistently a little more competition.
I think specifically Madison and Franklin who have generally been more physical than the other
players they've played against would maybe struggle to find a few more angles and things like that but
they've been good and consistent all the way through and not that I'm surprised they're good
volleyball players but just that they've been this consistent this early in their professional
career I think is surprising. All right we got one more looking at PVF. Are you more surprised
that Merritt Beeson is nowhere to be found on the individual stats leaderboard or are you more
surprised that Natalie Foster was an all-star snub? What stat leaderboard are you talking about? All of
them. Every single skill? Beeson is nowhere to be found. Points, kill percentage, anything. If I have
to pick one I would say I'm probably more surprised that Foster was snubbed for the all-star game.
Coming into the PVF season I to be completely honest didn't expect much from either of those
players. Beeson had been in the tank with Nebraska for a better part of two months almost so I didn't
really think that she would be doing much on the professional level. Natalie Foster she was she was
a good server for SMU but I didn't really her offense and her blocking skills as a middle didn't
really impress me all that much so I didn't expect much from either of them. Fast forward
Foster has put up great numbers in the PVF for her team so if I take that into consideration
she should have been picked for the all-star game based on what she has done in PVF so I mean Beeson
from what I've seen is playing pretty well for her team but am I shocked that she's not leading in the
stats? Absolutely not. I definitely think Natalie Foster should have been at the all-star game but
Beeson surprises me more than that. I understand that she didn't have a great end of the college
season with Nebraska. For me looking at her I thought she had potential I thought PVF was
going to be a really good fit for her kind of level wise and I thought getting out of Nebraska
and starting over that she was going to kind of find her groove again because she's capable of being
a good player I thought when I looked at some of these rosters to begin with that Beeson was going
to find her time to shine in this league and in that setting and find her footing after the college
season so like you said she hasn't been playing poorly but I expected her to get to the point
where she was going to be a standout for her team so that's that was my take on that one. I really
like this game. I'll give you one more bonus question. Oh dear did you even write it down or
just come up with this on the fly? I didn't write it down but I'm so similar to kind of the love
rookies we've seen more and more first year NCAA graduates making more of an impact in PVF across
the board as the season goes on. I don't have a comparison but how surprised are you that you
were starting to see these top college players make a difference in the league kind of across the board?
I think I'm less surprised in PVF than I am on the love side of things. I mean we've talked about
this the college athletes had game experience they had a season under their belt as they came
into these seasons and I've said it so many times I do feel like the style and level of play with
PVF is like an extension of college so I'm not as surprised to see that on the PVF side. Well I hope
you enjoyed that game. If you had fun we'll put that into the bank of games and we'll roll through
this again when I get a few more questions to go. It is time for listener questions. I'm pulling
from the question bank here everybody we keep getting some every week so we love it thank you
so much. This is a broad question I'm passing this one to Adam right away. How is men's volleyball
different from women's? Okay so off the top two things. One women are more consistent and they
make better decisions than men do. I mean in life basically just kidding but I'm not. And men are
more physical and they have the ability to impact the game in a more meaningful way but more
inconsistently. So what I mean by that is you look at a women's team and you can generally know what
you're going to get right. This hitter hits these angles they're generally this consistent this is
their style it's a more consistent product and you don't generally see one woman dominate a match
kind of one time and then not be very good and then somebody else does another time and that
lends to it to the physicality difference between men and women. On the men's side if you have a
player who is just feeling it one day they can be unstoppable but then be absolutely terrible tragic
right and so you will see in certain matches one guy just has a great day slept well felt good
jumped well closed his eyes swung scored five aces three blocks 20 kills can't stop him and then
the next night he's tragic. And so the ability to affect a game in that regard is different than
the women's game and you also see the guys in general try more risky plays. You see guys
screaming out of the back row trying to hit balls on two that were dug and just there's a different
approach to how to score points and sometimes it works and everything bounces in your favor and
sometimes it doesn't so that physicality and for a guy to be on and just be able to score 30 points
you there are female players who can do that but you have more wild cards in the men's game in that
regard. To simplify it even further I would say the women's game is much more ball control focused
because women are inherently less physical than men you're not seeing the same power you're not
seeing the same angles being hit necessarily the same height on the attack so that brings the defense
into the game a lot more so that's why you see extended rallies. With men it is sheer physicality
and power you see them bombing serves at each other you see the attacks are so dominant like if
a team is in system in the men's game they're scoring so and that's why the rallies are so much
shorter so you see for me a huge difference is like the ball control style versus power.
So I think you're uniquely situated to answer this question is there a big difference between
indoor and beach volleyball can a player who's good at indoor transition smoothly to playing the
beach or vice versa? There is a huge difference between indoor and beach volleyball I learned the
hard way that they are two completely different sports beach volleyball is not just indoor played
on sand that's what I thought when I started and boy was I wrong. So they are completely different
even the technique in how to do certain skills in particular blocking how you approach the jumping
style the setting there are you if you grew up playing indoor and you want to play beach
effectively you have to retrain your body to learn those new skills. The strategy is completely
different you cannot compare them the only thing they really share in my mind is like the bump set
spike aspect and like the name volleyball other than that very different. As far as can a player
who's good at indoor transition smoothly to the beach? Yes it has happened would I say it has
happened smoothly? No. I think you also can't compare like the 80s 90s era to today like
back in the 80s and 90s you had guys like Mike Dodd, Karch Karai, St. John Smith who went back
and forth no problem the game has completely changed since then it is a hundred percent
different than it used to be so I would say if you're looking at present day it is very difficult
for players to transition from indoor to beach and vice versa. The skill sets are completely
different it is very rare to see a good indoor player and by good I mean like top level not
like you play club volleyball have success on the beach and I think it's even more rare to see a
beach volleyball player have any type of success indoor. It's possible but as I said the skill sets
and the techniques are so different that it does require a lot of time and patience mind you I'm
talking about this from like world tour Olympic level if you're going out and playing with your
friends a hundred percent you can make the transition I am talking like at the highest
level of both sports so keep that in mind but I think if you're playing recreationally
a hundred percent you can make the switch. Kind of building off of that question our next one is
why do you think the San Diego mojo doesn't play Sarah Sponsel? They have an Olympian on their bench
and they aren't using her in any capacity aside from the occasional double sub. So I think this
comes back to what you said in terms of the games being completely different so while Sponsel is an
Olympian and she has those intangibles that she's learned to perform at a high level she probably
isn't running the offense that San Diego wants to run so having her on the team in the regards of
hey this is how you work at practice this is how you train you know all of those things that she's
put a ton of work into to make it to the Olympics and beach volleyball those intangibles are
translatable to the training environment but not necessarily on the court in a play style and so
you know obviously without having seen her at practice or see her play my initial instinct is
she's just not delivering a ball consistently to all of the different hitters like in beach you're
setting one person and so you know for those reasons that would be my guess she's just not
delivering either a the decision making from an offensive standpoint or b the consistency of
location for her hitters that move her in front of their current setter. And I mean again if you
want to talk about her style of play on the beach she dug balls because she was relentless
she maybe didn't always make the best reads she might have been out of position but she worked
really hard and sacrificed her body to get touches you can't get away with that indoor
you need to be able to set up around the block you need to be in a good position because the ball is
coming so much faster at you that you can't make up being out of position or you can't run around
trying to get touches like you have to be incredibly disciplined in indoor particularly from the
defensive side and given her beach style does it translate I don't know. Well and let's be honest
how long did she go without playing indoor was it five years six years and yeah it's it's hard to
it's it's hard to not do something at a high level and then switch right away do I think that maybe
she could get there by the end of the season by next year with her work ethic and like you said
her determination maybe but she's clearly not there yet according to the coach. Our last question has
to do with the specific player so what do you think about Morgan Hentz staying in the PVF she's
obviously a prospect for USA as she was a first alternate we've talked about PVF being maybe less
competitive than love and less competitive than being overseas do you think she should stay there
or what's her kind of next progression? It's so hard to know because you don't know what contractual
agreements were in place you don't know did she have an advocate to you know present her as an
option to love did love show any interest in her like it's just really hard to know and I know we've
mentioned this so many times with love like so many of those players have really big instagram
followings so like you look at the backup libero for Houston is Morgan Hentz better than her hands
down but this girl has 17 million instagram followers and I think in love trying to build
their brand that kind of takes precedent in some situations I don't know maybe she feels loyalty
to PVF because she played with them in their inaugural season like again she's very good
I think she's probably higher than the PVF level I mean she has played overseas already but maybe
there's some personal attachment or love wasn't interested like I really don't know I do think
she's very good she was the alternate for the for the US Olympic roster so building on the question
this person also asked past Justine Wong-Arantes who will be the next libero could she still be
in the conversation? I think she has a chance but I also think Lexi Rodriguez is coming up
if Lexi Rodriguez can get some playing time somewhere I think she could make a push for
that spot but I wouldn't I wouldn't take Hentz out of the conversation yes she's playing in a
lower level league I hope she I hope she can play at a higher level maybe she doesn't want to maybe
she wants to stay home I have no clue but I wouldn't take her out of the conversation I think she's
still in it. The other thing to note about that is it's really hard for liberos to get contracts
just because a lot of especially leagues overseas you have foreign limits and you can get local
liberos you can get you're not going to spend one of those roster spots necessarily on a libero and
so the options for those players can sometimes be super limited and you have to take what you get
and work on your game well and liberos are the lowest paid position in volleyball I mean yeah
foreign teams they invest in foreign point scorers in their view I understand everybody has a role
but in the owner's view those are the people that help you win scoring points so it's tough
to get a roster spot and it's tough to make money as a libero. Thank you so much for everybody who
has submitted questions as I say every week I have all of your questions written down we will get to
them all eventually but we really enjoy this kind of engagement with our listeners so please keep
these questions coming. All right let's look forward to the upcoming week so if we look at
love the head-to-head match is going to be on Thursday at 8 p.m. Eastern and that's going to be
between Houston and Salt Lake. The weekend with love is in Madison so hopefully we'll see a spark
for them playing at home that's going to happen on Friday and Saturday those matches will be on
love live or on the women's sport network this week. In NCAA men's action we're going to head
to the East Coast and on Thursday at 8 o'clock p.m. Eastern Lewis is going to play Loyola Chicago
which should be a really good game. Thursday and Friday at 9 p.m. Eastern Grand Canyon plays
Pepperdine and on Saturday at midnight Eastern and Sunday at 10 p.m. Eastern Hawaii is going to play
UC Irvine which I have that circled in my calendar. We're on Pacific time so it's not quite that late
still past my bedtime. But I think UC Irvine needs to have a good week I think Hawaii is
incredibly talented I think that's going to be a really good match. I'm excited to see that again.
100%. And don't forget women's champions league round one quarterfinals are on Eurovalley.tv
on Wednesday it'll be mid-day-ish in North America. Pop up your second monitor at work
put the game on pretend you're working it'll be worth it I promise. That's what Adam does all the
time. If we look at PVF Thursday 8 o'clock Eastern Omaha plays Orlando and Vegas plays Indy we'll be
looking for Vegas to rebound see how they play on that one and the Omaha Orlando match two top
teams in the league that should be a good one. That concludes this week's episode of Volley Talk
there's always something shaking in the volleyball world and we hope you enjoyed this little fix.
Be sure to follow the show so you don't miss any updates and we'd be so grateful if you'd leave us
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or at info at sarahpavin.com. Thanks so much for joining us and we'll be back next week.