Sooner Volleyball: Drops 2nd 4-Set Match of the Week

Forum to discuss OU volleyball
Post Reply
OUBeliever56A
Posts: 4500
Joined: Wed Oct 27, 2021 6:44 am
2
Location: Norman
Has thanked: 607 times
Been thanked: 2559 times

Sooner Volleyball: Drops 2nd 4-Set Match of the Week

Post by OUBeliever56A »

Sooner Volleyball: Drops A 4-set Match to Texas* Tech on the Road

The Oklahoma Sooner Volleyball Team dropped a 4-set Match to the Red Raiders last night in Lubbock. The set scores were 17-25, 23-25, 25-22 and 18-25.

The staff writers article below:

https://soonersports.com/news/2022/10/1 ... texas-tech

I see by looking at the box score that Wilson did not play after the second set. I was at the Softball Battle Series 2 on Wednesday night. I will watch the match on ESPN+ on Thursday and will try to have some comments about the Match later.

Boomer Sooner!
OUBeliever56A
Posts: 4500
Joined: Wed Oct 27, 2021 6:44 am
2
Location: Norman
Has thanked: 607 times
Been thanked: 2559 times

Post by OUBeliever56A »

I was able to watch the match with Texas Tech yesterday. specifically, I was looking for some sort of indication as to why Megan Wilson did not play in the 3rd and 4th sets. It is just very unusual for Wilson to not be playing. In 2021, Wilson played in 106 sets out of 107. So far in 2022, Wilson had played in 55 of 56 sets before the Texas Tech match.

I did not see anything resembling that Wilson might have had an injury. It simply looks like Coach Gray-Walton went a different direction in the last two sets against Tech.

The Sooners played well in sets 2 and 3 against Tech. In the 3rd set, the Sooners held the lead from a 4-9 score all the way to the 25-22 win. In the 2nd set, from the tie score of 11-11 the set was very close until the very end when Tech simply won the last two points to win 25-23.

In both of the 1st and 4th sets, from a tie score of 6-6 the Red Raiders took the lead and just kept lengthening their lead to sets wins of 25-17 and 25-18.

The Sooners were led in scoring by Shelton with 14.0 points. Oliver followed with 13.0 points. Davison totalled 11.0 points for a third player with double-digit points. Preston and Perkins followed with 9.5 and 6.5 points. Wilson had 4.0 points in her two sets while Chamberlain had 3.5 points and Kemohah and Thompson had 1.0 each.

Hopefully, the Sooners rebound on Saturday evening against Iowa State for a victory at home during Alumni Weekend for the Sooner Volleyball Team. The Match with the Cyclones starts at 6 PM. The Match will also be televised on ESPN+.

Boomer Sooner!
OUBeliever56A
Posts: 4500
Joined: Wed Oct 27, 2021 6:44 am
2
Location: Norman
Has thanked: 607 times
Been thanked: 2559 times

Post by OUBeliever56A »

The Oklahoma Sooner Volleyball Team celebrated their Alumni weekend as they introduced a large group of former Volleyball Stars to the crowd and the current team. The former players were impressive with their lists of accomplishments. A few of them even looked like they could perhaps still play today.

As far as the match last night with the Iowa State Cyclones, the first two sets were very close as the two teams competed strongly. Here is the staff writers article about the Cyclones win over the Sooners 3 sets to 1 set on Saturday evening.

https://soonersports.com/news/2022/10/1 ... -in-norman

The Cyclones is a very powerful team. They just keep setting the ball to powerful hitters on both sides of the floor. They are a team of interchangeable parts. They use two setters instead of a dedicated setter. The hit the ball very hard at the net and block well also.

The Sooners got off to a good start last night as they finished strong to win a close set by the score of 25-22. In the second set, Iowa State did much of the same as they played well late in the set and won the second set 25-22 over Oklahoma.

In the third set the Sooners had a difficult time scoring with the ball on their side of the court. Iowa State won 25-15. Oklahoma tried to rally late in the 4th set, but they fell short 25-21 to the Cyclones.

Oklahoma played without Morgan Perkins (Freshman MB) last night. Kelsey Carrington replaced Perkins in the starting lineup and performed well defensively for the Sooners. Wilson and Davison were the two primary scorers for the Sooners last night with 18.5 and 16.5 points as both had kill% of over .244 %.

From a fans perspective, the Sooners had trouble last night getting good strong plays on the ball as they attacked the Cyclones. Many times they had to just 'push' or 'lob' or just get the ball over the net while on the attack. Some of those 'pushes' did result in points, but too many are played easily for strong kill shots by the opponent. I am not knowledgeable enough to diagnose if it is a setting problem or a timing issue or both. But I do think that the reception of the ball and the first hit of the ball by the Sooners was not a strong point last night. On too many points, Chamberlain (setter) was moving a great deal to get to the ball to make the set pass to the hitter. She had many difficult tries for the sets. Iowa State did pound the ball at the net which makes returning the ball for strong kill attempts more difficult. Iowa State also had a pretty get sets of servers as a team. The Sooners need to find a way to be able to attack the net more consistently during plays. They just seemed to 'softly return' the ball too many times last night.

Next week the Sooners host Kansas State on Wednesday night @ 6 PM at McCasland Field House. They then make a quick turnaround and travel to Ft. Worth for a match with TCU on Friday at 12:30 PM. The Sooners are now 1-5 in the Big 12 and 11-7 overall. Kansas State is 2-4 in the Big 12 and 11-8 overall. TCU is 4-3 in the Big 12 and 9-9 overall. TCU does not play on Wednesday. If the Sooners could manage at least one win this week they could start to turn their Big 12 play around perhaps. Hopefully, Perkins is able to return this week to help the Sooners.

The Sooners have a lot of talent on the floor, they just need one special 'something' to get themselves together and playing just a few points better each set. They are close, but the Big 12 play is tough competition.

Boomer Sooner!
Post Reply

Create an account or sign in to join the discussion

You need to be a member in order to post a reply

Create an account

Not a member? register to join our community
Members can start their own topics & subscribe to topics
It’s free and only takes a minute

Register

Sign in