Key Weekend for Sooner VB: Illinois and Notre Dame this weekend!

[OUBeliever56A]

I think this weekend for the Sooner Women's Volleyball team is a key weekend. If they can travel up the land of Golden Domes and come away with a 2-0 record, things are looking up for the Sooners. If they return with a 1-1 record, their play could still be uplifting. If they return 0-2, it would probably not be a good thing for them.

The Sooners play Illinois on Friday at 5 PM CST. It looks like there is a 'Live Stats' feed for the match. On the Illinois site, it looks like you can listen to a radio call of the match. I may have to check that out.
The Sooners play Notre Dame on Saturday at 1 PM CST. This game is on the ACCNX network and also has a "Love Stats" feed. This game time conflicts with the Parade of Champions on Saturday at 2 PM. But maybe I can watch it on Sunday morning early.
Illinois is 4-1 in the young 2023 season. They were 15-15 in 2022 and 10-10 in the tough Big 10 Conference. Notre Dame was 10-18 in 2022 and 5-13 in the ACC Conference.

Oklahoma comes int the weekend with a 4-1 record in 2023 and had a 15-13 overall record in 2022 and a 5-13 record in the Big 12 Conference.

But I expect both matches to be a challenge for the Sooners. As a point of reference, Illinois lost to Wichita State 2 sets to 3 sets and Notre Dame won over Wichita State 3 sets to 2 sets. Notre Dame also lost to Texas Tech 1 set to 3 sets. Oklahoma lost to Wichita State in exhibition play in their first match of the 2023 season. I think if it was a 'real' match OU would have defeated Wichita State as they played many substitutes the last two sets. OU split with Texas Tech in 2022 losing 1 - 3 in Lubbock and winning 3 - 2 in McCasland.

A few things I will be watching are these in the two matches:

1) How Sydney Thompson and Chloe Kaminski are used. I think Mele Corral-Blagojevich is the first designated server for the Sooners probably for Daleigh Ellison. It looks like that maybe Thompson has passed by Kaminski into the 2nd spot as a server. I wonder if Raylee Fay is still called on to serve on the second rotation. It probably all depends on how, Lydia Burts, Alexis Shelton and Taylor Preston serve on their first attempts. Callie Kemohah (Libero) will be used as a server for either Burts or Pfiffner in all likelihood.

2) Can the Sooners reduce serving errors and have at least as many serving Aces as errors in each set? That is the goal for the Sooners.
The blocking results at the net on defense. The blocking game has tailed off the last few matches. After averaging 10.3 blocking points in the first weekend in 3 matches, the Sooners recorded only 9 blocking points total in the second weekeen in 2 matches for a 4.5 average.

3) The attacking game at the net on offense should be good between Shelton, Preston, Burts, Ellison and Pfiffner with Chamberlain and Kemohah setting the ball to them. The key is to reduce the attack errors for a higher hitting % in each set. If the Sooners are above .275 for a hitting % in a set, they should be in the set and have a chance to win the set. If they do that and serve well they have the skills to play well enough to be in every set with a chance to win. The Sooners always seem to play defense in the back row well, picking up tough digs and moving the ball to the setters 90% of the time. If they keep it above 90% they are good to go.

Good luck to the Sooners on Friday night and Saturday afternoon.

Boomer Sooner!

[OUBeliever56A]

Here is the Sooner staff writers article about the Sooners Volleyball trip to South Bend, IN for their final road non-conference weekend of 2023.

https://soonersports.com/news/2023/9/7/ ... vitational

As the article states, the Indiana match is available to track with "Live Stats". the Notre Dame match is available to watch via the ACC Network on "Live Stats" also.

Good luck to the Soones!

Boomer Sooner!

[OUBeliever56A]

First match of the weekend against Illinois was a success for the OU Volleyball Team as they defeated Illinois in 3 straight sets by the scores of 25-16, 25-22 and 25-20.

The 'Live Stats" feed for the match did not 'work'. I was helped by a friend who told me it was on a Illini radio broadcast. I selected that option from the Illini VB schedule and followed in that way. I arrived there before the 1st set ended. If you have not heard VB on the radio, it was not too bad. The announcer did a decent job. A couple of his comments were; 1) Alexis Shelton is the best player you have never heard of. 2) Oklahoma is going to surprise some people as they are much better than what I had understood. They are a legit Top 25 Team if they play this way every match. Both of those phrases are paraphrased from my memory. I think both of those statements are telling coming from a Big 10 VB announcer who sounded knowledgeable about the sport. My only criticism of the announcer was that he told you on almost each point the "set score". If I would have been an Illini fan, I would have been tired of hearing the my team was trailing 1 set to 0 or 2 sets to 0 "all the time". As an Ou fan, it was nice to hear, but not every point.

Here is the Sooner staff writers article about the win for the Sooner VB Team.

https://soonersports.com/news/2023/9/8/ ... vitational

I noticed during the broadcast that I did not hear two names very much. I did not remember hearing Chloe Kaminski or Mele Corral-Blagojevich much during the broadcast. Looking at the stats this morning, I see why. Kaninski did not play and MCB only subbed in for Daleigh Ellison for back row defensive play. Ellison did serve during the entire match. That is a new wrinkle for the Sooners. I noticed that in the last two matches out west that Ellison did serve in those matches but not full time. It seems now that Ellison has won a full time serving job for the Sooners. Sydney Thompson is subbing in and serving for either Taylor Preston or Hannah Pfiffner. Callie Kemohah serves for the other, probably Pfiffner. Raylee Fay will sub in for Lydia Burts and serve in the second rotation but Burts serves the first rotation. The Sooners are using only 7 players for serving these days. I would have to do some checking, but I think last night was the first match that Kaminski did not play in during her career. If I remember right she played in every match as a freshman in 2022. Last night was the first time that MCB has not served in a match also.

As for the stats, the Sooners played well according to the what they indicate. The Sooners served well as they had 6 Aces against only 5 service errors. IF I counted the serves correctly, they had 6 Aces in 73 service attempts in the match for an 8.2 Ace%. Their 'serve-in%' was a lofty 0.932%. The Sooners outhit the illini at the net with a .339 Hitting% to the .180 Hitting% for Illinois. The Sooners posted a .4495 Kill% to a .340 Kill% for Illinois. OU also had a better night at the net on blocks as they picked up 10 Block Points against 6.5 for Illinois.

Individually, Taylor Preston led the Sooners with 17.0 points on 15 Kills and 2 block points. Alexis Shelton was close behind her with 14.0 points with 12 Kills and 2 block points. Lydia Burts added a strong 12.5 points in the middle with 9 Kills and 2.5 block points and 1 service ace. Hannah Pfiffner and Daleigh Ellison both added 9.5 points showing the depth of the Sooner hitters. Pfiffner had 8 Kills and 1.5 points on blocks while Ellison showed her all-around game with 5 Kills, 1.5 block points and 3 services aces. The scoring was finished off by Payton Chamberlain with 1 service ace and 0.5 block points and Sydney Thompson with 1 service ace.

Chamberlain picked up 34 assists in the match with Kemohah picking up another 10 assists in the match. This is another change for the Sooners in 2023. When Chamberlain is on the back row, she is an active defensive player to receive the play from the other team. She is effective in picking up Digs on defense with Kemohah or other Sooners bumping the ball to the hitters when necessary. I actually like this as it gives you 3 back row effective defenders instead of sometimes only 2 as it often was in 2022. Kemohah is very capable of bumping the ball to a hitter. Chamberlain led in Digs with 14, Kemohah had 11, MCB had 5, Shelton and Thompson had 3 and Pfiffner had 1 at the net. The Sooners only had 7 errors on defense.

The Sooners earned 65 points against only 25 errors in the match which produced 2.6 more points vs every error. Illinois only managed 1.625 points vs their errors.

Today at 1 PM CST, the Sooners play Notre Dame. Notre Dame defeated Illinois 3 sets to 0 sets with the set scores of 25-21, 25-19, 25-22. Those sets scores are very similar to set scores for the Sooners win over the Illini. Notre Dame is now 3-2 on the season.

Good luck to the Sooners today at 1 PM. I will be at the Sooner Champions parade which starts at 2 PM on Asp near the Baked Bear and then proceeding south to the Union building. So I will try to follow the match on Live Stats and then watch it later hopefully on Sunday. I hope the parade is well attended by fans.

Boomer Sooner!

[OUBeliever56A]

I was only able to see part of the 1st set and then the end of the 3rd set and then the final two sets against Notre Dame. It was a five set match that OU lost in overtime of the 5th set 16-18.

I will have much more tomorrow. It is time to go to the field to watch OU-SMU.

BTW, the Parade of Champions was pretty well done. I have a couple of pictures of the softball team that I will post tomorrow. Nellian McEnroe-Marinas has some size to her along with the other three Sooners. Kelly Maxwell was there also.

Boomer Sooner!

[OUBeliever56A]

Through three sets on Saturday afternoon the Oklahoma Sooners Volleyball Team looked in control of their match against the Fighting Irish of Notre Dame. They led 2 sets to 1 set with scores of 29-27, 21-24 and 25-14. At that point the Sooners were out-hitting the Irish at the net by impressive margins. The Sooners had a Hitting% of .326% and had a Kill% of .453% at that time. Notre Dame had a Hitting% of .196% and a Kill% of .336%. The Sooners were also serving well with .876 'serve-in'% and had 6 Aces against 10 serving errors. During the first three sets, their were 14 times that the score was tied and there was 6 lead changes with the lead changing 4 times in the first set.

But in the last two sets, the Sooners dropped their level of play or Notre Dame significantly upped their level of play to overtake the Sooners and win the last two sets by the scores of 25-22 and 18-16. In very closely played sets, the lead changed 6 times in Set 4 and 3 times in set 5 while their were 19 times that the score was tied. In the 4th set, the Sooners had a tough time at the net on offense. The Sooners had 13 Kills against 9 errors in 40 attempts for a Hitting% of .100% and a Kill% of .325%. Notre Dame meanwhile had 13 Kills against 6 errors in 30 attempts for a Hitting% of .233% and a Kill% of .433%. In addition to that the OU serving game slowed down a bit and they had 3 serving errors with a single Ace in 23 tries. But there were serving errors by the Sooners a couple time in key moments late in the set. Notre Dame changed the game with OU leading 11-7. At that point, Notre Dame scored six straight points. Two (2) of those were on Notre Dame kills but 4 points came on 4 hitting errors by the Sooners with only 1 Notre Dame block.

From that point in the 4th set the score was tied at 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20 and 21. With the score tied at 21-all, OU had a serving error. Then with a score of 22-23, OU had another serving error. On their first attempt at set point, Notre Dame won the set with a kill by the score of 25-22.

In the 5th set, which is a quick set to 15 points with the team changing sides when the first team reaches 8 points, the Sooners got of to a very poor start in the set from the service line. In the first serving rotation (all six servers for OU) they had 5 service errors in 8 serv attempts. That means that OU gave up 5 points without Notre Dame having to play the serves. That is a tough start, yet someway the Sooners only trailed 10-11. After an attack error by the Sooners that made the score 10-12, the Sooners ran-off 4 straight points to take a 14-12 lead on a Kill by Shelton, a block by Burts and Chamberlain, a Kill by Burts and a second Kill by Shelton. The held he ball and a set point and the game in hand. Notre Dame picked a big Kill by the very good OH Palazzolo followed by an attack error by OU to even the score at 14-14. OU took the lead on another Kill by Shelton to lead 15-14. Again a set point with the serve. The Sooners suffered another service error to tie the score again at 15-all. Oklahoma picked up another point on a Kill by Preston but that was countered by a Kill by Palazzolo for Notre Dame to tie the score at 16-all. The set ended and the match ended on two attack errors by OU with the second including a block by Notre Dame at the block as Note Dame won the set and the match 18-16. During the 5th set, OU was able to get two key reversals late in the set to pick up two points instead of losing two point.

I do think the Sooners played very well, but late in the 4th and 5th sets, the Sooners were unable to win some key points and also serve well in an effort to win the match and dropped a match that they might have won. But Notre Dame is a very capable team of their own right.

Speaking of good play, no great play, Alexis Shelton had a big night in a losing effort for the Sooners. Shelton picked up 30 Kills on 58 attempts with only 9 errors. That is a Hitting% of .362% and a Kill% of .517%. She also added a Service Ace, and 1.5 block points for a total of 32.5 points for Oklahoma. Shelton also had 7 Digs on the back row. Shelton is having a fine season in 2023 so far. Shelton is averaging 19.7 PPG in 2023.

Taylor Preston added 17.0 points on 16 Kills and 1.0 Block points. Daleigh Ellison added 12.0 points on 7 Kills, 3 Service Aces, and 2.0 Block points. Hannah Pfiffner scored 10.0 points on 8 Kills, and 2 Block points. Lydia Burts added 9.0 points on 5 Kills and 1 Service Ace and 3.0 Block points. Payton Chamberlain added 3.0 points with 1 Service Ace and 2.0 Block points. Raylee Fay added 1.0 point on a Service Ace. Chamberlain added 51 assists (her second career match with 50+ assists). Kemohah had 4, Pfiffner had 2, and Shelton, Sydney Thompson and Mele Corral-Blagojevich each had 1 assist. Kemohah led in Digs with 14 followed by Thompson (9), Chamberlain (8), Shelton (7), Ellison and MCB (6), Burts (2) and Fay (1).

The Sooners are now 5-2 on the season. It is a shame that they were unable to win yesterday over Notre Dame and been able to return to Norman on a very good note to play for the first time at home on Friday and Saturday next weekend. Their opponent next weekend is UCLA in a two-match weekend. UCLA is 6-1 in 2023 play and was 16-13 in play in 2022. They were 10-10 in Pac-10 Play in 2022. UCLA also has a new head coach in 2023 in Alfred Reft as he is moving from San Diego to UCLA. Reft also has Big 10 Head Coaching experience. From what I see, UCLA has picked up several transfers for the 2023 season. In the early play the Bruins have only lost to LSU as they split two matches in the first weekend of play. UCLA does have a match on Sunday night the 10th against Hawaii. It really sounds like UCLA is in a bit of a rebuilding mode jus tlike OU.

It sounds strange to say this, but when I saw UCLA on the schedule for the first weekend at home for the Sooners when the schedule was released, I thought "that might be a tough home opener for the Sooners". But now, I feel much better about the matchup. Neither UCLA or Oklahoma has played a ranked team so far in 2023 so it is hard to tell who is the stronger team before they play. It should be a big opener for the Sooner VB Team on Friday night at 5 PM. The match on Saturday begins at 2 PM. (This does create a conflict with the OU football game at Tulsa which starts at 2:30 PM. I wonder if the Sooners might try to move the game to an earlier time due to that.) Regardless, i will be at McCasland Field House to watch the Sooners take on the UCLA Bruins for both matches.

Boomer Sooner!