Oklahoma Volleyball travels to Texas Tech for Wednesday Match!

[OUBeliever56A]

The Oklahoma Sooner Volleyball Team is on the road for the final time on Wednesday in a match in Lubbock vs Texas Tech at an unusual time of 2 PM today. The Sooners are coming off of the 3rd conference win at Cincinnati last Saturday in a five set match where OU won the first two sets, dropped the next two sets then won the final 5th set. The win gave OU a split of their two matches in Cincinnati on Friday and Saturday.

The Sooner are 3-13 in conference and 10-16 overall. Texas Tech is also 3-13 in the Big 12 and are 10-18 overall. The OU-Texas Tech match will be on ESPN+ today.

One key factor for today's match will be the availability of Alexis Shelton for the Sooners. Shelton injured her left leg i believe at the very end of the Friday match in Cincinnati. then on Saturday she was courtside but did not play in the Sooners win over Cincinnati on Saturday. The Sooners really played well without Shelton on the floor to defeat Cincinnati on Saturday with Ireland McNees replacing Shelton at OH. Both were five set matches.

Here is the Sooner staff writers article about the match with Texas Tech today.

https://soonersports.com/news/2023/11/2 ... u-saturday

Texas Tech opened their Big 12 play with a win over a ranked Kansas team in 5 sets in Lubbock. Then Tech lost 11 straight matches before defeating West Virginia in both matches of their DH at home. Texas Tech then lost their last two matches to create their 3-13 conference record. Texas Tech is 3-5 at home this season in conference. Oklahoma is 2-6 on the road in conference.

Tech is lead by #3 Dugan and #4 Williams at the net as both of the OH have over 325 points. At MB, #17 Engler and at RS #23 Merrick have over 190 points. Dugan and Engler have hitting%'s over .200 on the season. Setter, #16 Rhodes (6'1") has almost 700 assists this season and has 99.5 points in the season with 61 kills and 24.5 block points and 14 service aces. The Red Raiders have 6 servers with double-digit aces and as a team has a serve-in % of 89.1%. Tech has 5 players with over 130 Digs with #9 Correa leading the way with 373. #19 Hansen and Engler lead Texas Tech in blocks with over 40 block points each.

As teams, Oklahoma leads in these categories; Kills per set, Hitting %, Assists per set, Service Aces per set, Tech leads in; Serve-In %, Fewer Service errors, Fewer Reception errors, Digs per set and Block Points per set.

In the Big 12 conference, 5 teams are ranked in the Top 25 teams with 2 more teams receiving points in the voting. Texas will win the Big 12 as they have a 16-1 record and have Tech left to play on Saturday. Texas is ranked as the #4 Team and the #5 RPI Team in the country. Kansas #14 RPI and 12-4 in conference, BYU #15 RPI and 11-5 and Houston #27 RPI and 10-6 in the conference are probably playoff teams from the Big 12. Iowa State and Baylor are in the top 36 teams in the country with their RPI ranking and are perhaps on the bubble in making the playoffs.

Oklahoma can possibly rise in the Big to finish in a tie for 10th with Cincinnati. OU can be considered as the favorite (with Shelton playing) against Tech today and against West Virginia next Saturday. That would give OU a 5-13 conference record. Cincinnati has a 5-11 record in conference currently but the have matches with Kansas at home and at Iowa State remaining as Cincy is the underdog in both matches. If The Sooners could finish in a tie for 10th after their coaching change and the transfers last summer, the season under Coach Mansfield could be called at least satisfactory, perhaps surprisingly good.

The Sooners will be celebrating their Seniors on Saturday in the match with West Virginia in their 1 PM first serve. The four seniors for the Sooners are; Kristen Birmingham, Kelsey Carrington, Daleigh Ellison and Callie Kemohah. I think that Kemohah, Ellison and Birmingham have one year of eligibility remaining if they chose to return. I also think that Burts (a Senior) has one year of eligibility left due to sitting out her freshman season at Liberty.

Good luck to the Sooners today in Lubbock.

Boomer Sooner!

[OUBeliever56A]

Five sets were played in Lubbock on Wednesday in the 2 PM first serve match between Oklahoma and Texas Tech. The decisive 5th set went to Tech 15-13 as the Red Raiders rallied 9-12 deficit to win the final set by winning 6 points to OU's single point. It was an example of the swings back-and-forth between Oklahoma and Texas Tech in the 5 set match. the set scores were OU 25-20, Tech 25-20, OU 25=23, Tech 25-19 and Tech 15-13.

In the first set, the Sooners led 20-19 in a closely played set. After an OU timeout, OU ran off 5 of 6 points with 3 Kill points, a service ace and a Tech error to win 25-20.

In the second set, OU led 20-18 and then Texas Tech switched into high gear as they won 7 straight points on an OU service error, an OU attack error and then 5 straight Tech Kills at the net. It was a set that Oklahoma perhaps let go of that determined the match as Tech won 25-20.

Oklahoma might have pulled off their comeback of the season in the thirds set against Texas Tech. OU trailed by 8 points as Tech led 19-11. But started their rally with 4 straight points to make the score 19-15. Tech picked up a point on a OU Service Error to make it 20-15. OU won two more points to make it 20-17. then Tech won 3 points and looked like the winner of the set with their 23-17 lead. But a huge comeback by the Sooners followed as they won 8 straight points on 5 Sooner Kills, 1 Sooner Ace and 2 Tech errors at the net to win, no to steal a win from Texas Tech 25-23.

I thought the Sooners held a huge momentum advantage at this point and might win the match in 4 sets at this point. But to Tech's credit they played well in the 4th set and won the 4th 25-19. The 14 errors by OU opened the door for Tech to win the 4th set.

In the final set Oklahoma had a chance to win the deciding set but the Tech rally described above at the end of the match left OU with loss on the road.

The Sooners did play the match with alexis Shelton on the bench still nursing an injured leg from the Friday Cincinnati match. Oklahoma did have 5 players with double-digit points as Taylor Preston had 22 Kills and 23 points. Lydia Burts added 14 points on 13 Kills, Daleigh Ellison had 13.5 points on 13 Kills. Kesley Carrington had 11.5 points on 10 Kills and Ireland McNees had 10 points on 9 Kills and 1 service ace. Kemohah had 29 Digs, with McNees and Sydney Thompson both adding 11 digs. Tech served to Mele Corral-Blagojevich, McNees and Thompson as McNees had 33 receptions, MCB had 23 and Thompson had 22. Thompson had 4 service aces with Kemohah adding 2 aces of her own.

I think the Sooner errors did make it tough to win the match. The Sooners had 52 errors in the five sets, 15 more than Tech had. With Tech also having 7 more block points than the Sooners, even the 11 Kill advantage by OU was not enough to produce the win. Tech also outhit the Sooners .223 to .206 at the net.

The loss drops OU to 3-14 in the conference and 10-17 on the season. Oklahoma will finish their season on Saturday at 1 PM at McCasland Field House against West Virginia. WV is 2-15 in the Big 12. With a win the Sooners can ensure staying out of the basement of the Big 12 in 2023. The match is also the Senior Day celebration for Oklahoma for four Sooners, The four seniors for the Sooners are; Kristen Birmingham, Kelsey Carrington, Daleigh Ellison and Callie Kemohah. I think that Kemohah, Ellison and Birmingham have one year of eligibility remaining if they chose to return. I also think that Burts (a Senior) has one year of eligibility left due to sitting out her freshman season at Liberty.

Boomer Sooner!

[AustinTXSooner]

I admit that I don't know how hard it is to find a good Libero, but Kemohah has been fantastic. I'll hate to see her go.