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Volleyball vs Portland State Preview and Game Thread

cmgoods

Olympic Sports Mod
Club Member
Moderator
The women's volleyball team (2-1) is back in action tomorrow at 7pm when they host the Portland State Vikings (0-3). The Buffs are coming off of a couple of victories last Saturday after beating first Northern Illinois and then Presbyterian while Portland State lost both of their Saturday matches to Boise State and Gonzaga. This is the first ever meeting between these teams.

The Vikings had three players average 2.00 kills per set or higher in the first weekend. Roni LaPierre led PSU with 3.09 kills per set and Leigh-Ann Haataja recorded 2.91 kills per set. Cheyne Corrado was third on the squad with 2.73 kills per set. Haataja hit a team-best .316 with 32 kills and seven errors on 79 attacks. Erin Clark dished out 9.91 assists per set to lead the Vikings to a .251 hitting percentage.


In the back row, Kasimira Clark picked up 4.18 digs per set and Erin Clark recorded 1.91 digs per set. Katie O’Brien put up 0.82 blocks per set to lead the Vikings at the net and Haataja added 0.73 blocks per set.

The match is supposed to be streamed online for free, as well as, live stats for the game. I don't have the link for the video yet, but I'll post it tomorrow after work which should be right before the game begins. I'll also try to do some play-by-play if I can.

Live Stats
 
Need a comfortable win in this one. Hopefully get some younger players some court time.
 
Also, the Buffs will be handing out CU volleyball tank tops to the first 150 CU students in attendance.
 
The third set went the way I expected the whole match to go. First set was a bit sloppy on both sides. In the second set it was not good that CU had 5 set points that they could not convert. They did come back and win the set but it should not have gone to extra points.

Two of the freshmen got a lot of playing time.... Gabby Simpson and Anna Pfefferle. Gabby played mostly as a hitter. She has a really nice serve and had a few nice plays to go along with a few head-scratchers. Anna is a middle blocker and played pretty well. She had several blocks and she also has a nice serve. The third freshman only got in once as a serving sub and had a serving error. She is an outside hitter but I have not yet seen her hit. Don't know if its injury or if she is just not ready yet. Final new player is Rachel Hargis who got in late in the third set (to a pretty good ovation) and had a block or 2 as well as a kill and kept several other plays going. She looks more comfortable out there now.
 
The third set went the way I expected the whole match to go. First set was a bit sloppy on both sides. In the second set it was not good that CU had 5 set points that they could not convert. They did come back and win the set but it should not have gone to extra points.

Two of the freshmen got a lot of playing time.... Gabby Simpson and Anna Pfefferle. Gabby played mostly as a hitter. She has a really nice serve and had a few nice plays to go along with a few head-scratchers. Anna is a middle blocker and played pretty well. She had several blocks and she also has a nice serve. The third freshman only got in once as a serving sub and had a serving error. She is an outside hitter but I have not yet seen her hit. Don't know if its injury or if she is just not ready yet. Final new player is Rachel Hargis who got in late in the third set (to a pretty good ovation) and had a block or 2 as well as a kill and kept several other plays going. She looks more comfortable out there now.

I think patience will definitely be a virtue early this season for the fans. In addition to the freshmen getting a lot of work in the rotation, three sophomores are getting a lot of playing time, with only Cierra Simpson among them having gotten significant playing time last year. (I remember rightside Joslyn Hayes playing maybe 25% or so time last year, and defensive specialist Gwen Herring didn't play at all.)

On the bright side, the defensive stats were solid- I'm sure the Buffs have done it before, but holding any club under 0% in hitting % is great. (The stats show PSU hitting -.055.) I looked at Portland State's (PSU) record, and they were swept by (#5 ranked) Washington earlier this year scoring -19 -15 -16, so they aren't a horrible club. (They hit .222 against Washington.) Our offense will obviously need to be better than the .144 it was against Portland St., most immediately against Pitt since it sounds like they could be a challenge tomorrow evening. The fact a shorter and less prestigious team like PSU tied us in blocks at 10 (they only had 1 block against the Huskies) indicates some growing pains with all our new players, although that final set tonight when the Buffs played markedly better hopefully shows they know and can implement the answers to any issues.

Hopefully Alexis Austin will get healthy soon so she can help out. Also, going into this year my 1st guess at replacing Nikki Lindow at Middle Blocker was Katelyn Cuff (just based on her having some limited playing time last year, and my remembrance she looked to have a pretty quick jump while both blocking and hitting). However, she didn't play at all tonight, and didn't play at all in the two matches last Saturday, even in the relatively easy game they had with Presbyterian when Coach Kritza seemed to experiment with the lineup quite a bit. Don't know if Ms. Cuf is also fighting or recovering from some injury?
As you mention, however, Anna Pfefferle has been looking very solid, especially for a freshman, so her getting experience can only be of benefit later this year and beyond.

Anyway- a wins a win, and a straight set one even better- GO BUFFS!
 
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cmsgoods, the match was free to watch online. Think all the home matches will be, at least until conference play begins.
 
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