Oklahoma Volleyball is in Tulsa this week vs SF Austin and Tulsa

[OUBeliever56A]

The 3-1 Oklahoma Sooners Volleyball team will be in Tulsa this weekend as they play a match against Stephen F. Austin on Thursday at 4 PM and then have a match with Tulsa on Friday at 5:30 PM. After a season opening loss to TCU in 4 sets, the Sooners have won 3-straight matches winning 9 of 11 sets.

The Sooners first opponent, Stephen F. Austin, is 5-2 on the season won their first 5 matches before losing their last two matches in 5 sets each. Their two losses were to SE LA and UTEP. The Lumberjacks have 3 players with over 70 points in their 7 matches. They have four players with at least 16 block points. They have 3 players with 50 digs, 2 players with over 115 assists. They have 32 aces and 48 errors from the service line. They receive at a 94.8% rate on defense. SFA may be able to play a bit, but Oklahoma is probably the best team they have played in the young season.

Tulsa is 6-1 on the season. They lost to Baylor (18th ranked) in three straight sets. Tulsa has only played 4 sets twice. Tulsa has 6 players with 40 points and 3 players with 50 digs. They have 51 service aces and 56 service errors. Two players have over 80 assists. They receive at a 93.3% rate on defense. Outside of the Baylor match, OU will be their best team thay have faced. Former Sooners, Beth Bayliss (2022) is a starter for the Golden Hurricane.

The Sooners have settled int the season with 4 positions of the 7 settled, it seems. Alexis Shelton (Pin) has scored 95 points averaging 23.75 points per match. Shelton has 83 kills, 4 service aces and 8 block points. She has a 33.9 hitting% and a 46.1 kill%. She is playing all six rotations this season and being used on back row sets often. The Sooners are built around Shelton this season. Lydia Martin is one MB for the Sooners that is set to play each set. She has 37 points on the season with 25 kills, 12 block points. Martin has a 16.1 hitting% and a 40.3 kill%. Kari Geissberger has settled in as the #2 Pin. she has 42.0 points in the season with 38 kills and 4 block points. She has a 28.6 hitting% and a 45.2% kill%. Callie Kemohah is the Libero for the Sooners. she has tallied 56 digs and added 21 assists. She also has 4 service aces and 5 service erros. Kemohah is substituting for the two MBs each set and usually in to serve for both. The Sooner back row defense is centered around Kemohah.

The other three positions are still a work in progress. At setter, I think the job is Payton Chamberlain's but due to a lingering knee problem, she will be assisted by Leah Wilton-LaBoy. both have played well when they are in the lineup. Chamberlain has 115 assists in 11 sets. Wilton-LaBoy has 59 assists in 5 sets. Chamberlain has 1 service aces with 1 service error, 25 digs and 7.5 points on offense. Wilton-LaBoy 2 service aces with 1 service errors, 15 digs, 5.5 points on offense.

At the second MB position, two Sooners are competing for the playing time. Early on, Hannah Pfiffner was the starter, but lately KJ Burgess has been playing more. Burgess has played 13 sets and recorded 28.5 points with 19 kills 9.5 block points. Burgess has a 35.6 hitting% and a 42.2 kill%. Pfiffner has played in 3 sets and scored 5.5 points. She has a 16.7 hitting% and a 41.7 kill%. Burgess seems to have the upper hand right now due to her ability to block effectively.

The final Pin position is a competition between Kamille Gibson and Daleigh Ellison. Ellison has played 11 sets with 23.0 points. She has 21 kills with 2 block points. She has a 22.8 hitting% and a 36.8 kill%. Ellison also has 9 digs on defense. Gibson has played 7 sets and scored 16.0 points. She has 15 kills with 1 block point. Gibson has 4 digs on defense.

As defense replacements and server, Jasmine Ellison and Whitney Wallace have settled in to replace Geissberger/Ellison/Gibson. Both have made an immediate impact with their serves. J Ellison has 8 service aces with 5 service errors. Wallace has 7 service aces with 8 service errors. the two have 27 and 19 digs respectively. They are playing well as freshman in the lineup.

The Sooners need to play well this weekend to get ready for the weekend at K-State the following weekend. I think the Sooners should win both matches but they need to play well and win the two matches convincingly. Three sets wins are not required but they would be nice.

Good luck to the Sooner women volleyball players this weekend.

Boomer Sooner!

[OUBeliever56A]

[OUBeliever56A]

Here is the Sooner staff writers article about the Sooner Volleyball matches this week in Tulsa with SF Austin on Thursday and against Tulsa on Friday.

https://soonersports.com/news/2024/9/11 ... vitational

It looks like the SF Austin match is only going to have coverage via a Live Stats feed. The Tulsa match is going to be on ESPN+ on Friday. Yeah!

Good luck to the Sooners this weekend.

Boomer Sooner!

[OUBeliever56A]

[OUBeliever56A]

The Oklahoma Sooners Volleyball Team won over SF Austin on Thursday in 3 straight sets by the scores of 25-16, 26-24 and 25-18. There was radio coverage of the match yesterday by a SF Austin broadcaster and I must say he did a very nice job on the call. I enjoyed listening to him. I will alo say, that I do not think the Sooners played their best in the match either. But they still were good enough to win in three sets with only one set being less than a 7-point win.

The Sooners were still led by Alexis Shelton with 16 points but her hitting% was at 12.1% with a 36.4% on kills. She had 12 kills in 33 attempts with 2 service aces and 3 block points. Shelton got some quality help from Kari Geissberger though on 11 kills in 21 attempts with only 1 error for her 11.5 points with one shared block. This might have been Geissberger's best effort as a Sooner. Daleigh Ellison continued playing well with 8.5 points on 7 kills, and 1.5 points on blocks. Lydia Martin scored 6.5 points with 4 kills and 2.5 points on blocks. KJ Burgess also added 4.5 points on 4 kills and a shared block. Whitney Wallace added the final 2 points, on a service ace and 1 kill.

The starters looked to be Geissberger, Shelton and D Ellison at the Pins, Martin and Burgess at MB, Leah Wilton-LaBoy (31 assists and 14 Digs) at setter and Callie Kemohah at Libero (11 digs and 5 assists). Jasmine Ellison and Whitney Wallace were back row replacements for Ellison and Geissberger I think. Kemohah subs in for the MB's. It seems that Sydney Thompson subbed in for Shelton some on the back row. But Shelton is playing a full six rotations most of the time. I heard a back set being given to D Ellison as well yesterday so Ellison was in on the back row some as well.

OU had probably a few to many errors with 29 on the day. 17 kill errors is too many, 10 service errors is too many but they only had 2 other errors on the day on receptions and sets and blocks. SF Austin had 37 total errors.

In the first set, OU ran off 7 straight points after the score was 18-16 to win 25-16. Geissberger had 3 kills, Shelton had 1 in that run of 7 points.

In the second set, the score was close throughout and was tied at 24-all. Shelton nailed down the set with a kill and a service ace for the final two points.

In the third set, after an 11-11 tie the Sooners built a 20-15 lead. Geissberger, Burgess and Martin had kills to close it out along with two SF Austin errors to win 25-18.

Here is the Sooner staff writers article about the win for the Sooners over the Lumberjacks.

https://soonersports.com/news/2024/9/12 ... sday-night

The Sooners play today against Tulsa in Tulsa at 1 PM. BTW - A big BTW here -> Tulsa defeated #22 Arkansas in 5 sets last night. Tulsa won the first two sets with Arkansas rallying to win sets 3 and 4 before Tulsa won the decisive 5th set 15-8. Arkansas had 52 errors in the 5 set match. Tulsa only had 38 errors.

The Sooners should be ready for a good match today vs Tulsa who is 7-1 on the season. The match today against Tulsa is on ESPN+.

Boomer Sooner!

[OUBeliever56A]

The Oklahoma Sooner Volleyball team survived a match with the Golden Hurricane on Friday evening as they won in 5 sets over Tulsa and avoided the upset bid by Tulsa unlike the Arkansas Razorback VB team did on Thursday who fell to Tulsa in their 5 set match. But Tulsa certainly took advantage of every opportunity provided to them by the Sooners on Friday night. The Sooners ultimately won in 5 sets by the scores of 21-25, 19-25, 25-15, 25-22, 15-11 in a comeback effort after being down 2 sets to 0 sets.

The story of the match was the Sooner errors. Especially at the service line. The Sooners committed 18 service errors on the night. Watching the match it seemed like maybe 14 or so of the errors occurred on the first serve opportunity for a OU player. To me, the serve is a chance to win a point with one "hit" of the ball. It is also an opportunity to 'give' a point to the other team on an error. OU recorded one (1) service ace and committed those 18 service errors on Friday night. It is similar to a free shot in basketball. The expectation in basketball is to shot 70% or greater on those free shots. I think the expectation to at least hit the volleyball in the court and make the defense make a play to return the ball is at least 80% of the time and really needs to be higher than that. It is the one thing that happens every point. The serve really must be played successfully into the opponents court. Despite working very hard on improving the team's serving, the results are still not where they need to be. Okay...moving on to the positives of the match.

OU was a very effective wall on defense at the net. The Sooners collected 20 block points in the 5 sets. Oklahoma tallied 36 shared blocks while they picked up two individual blocks. the individual blocks where by KJ Burgess at MB. Lydia Martin earned 11 shared blocks in the math to lead OU. Kari Geissberger, Alexis Shelton, KJ Burgess and Leah Wilton-LaBoy each had 5 shared block with Kamille Gibson picking up 3 and Payton Chamberlain adding 2. The Sooners were averaging 10 block points a match before last night. The 36 shared blocks doubled their previous season high.

The Sooners totaled a hitting% of 31.2% and a kill% of 42.0% in the match also. The Sooner height and power at the net did show itself in the match. Martin recorded a 60.7 hitting% with KJ Burgess hitting at a 45.5% mark. Shelton led the Sooners with 22 kills while Martin added 18 kills. The leading points player in the match for Oklahoma was Shelton with 24.5 points on 22 kills and those 5 shared blocks. Martin also scored 23.5 points on the 18 kills and 11 shared blocks. Martin scored the most points of her Sooner career in the match. Geissberger added 10.5 points with 8 kills and 5 shared blocks. KJ Burgess almost reached double figures in points with 9.5 on 5 kills and 4.5 block points. While splitting time at the other pin position, Daleigh Ellison had 7.0 points on 7 kills, Gibson added 6.5 points on 5 kills and 1.5 block points. Wilton-LaBoy had 2.5 points on her 5 shared blocks. Chamberlain had 2 points on 1 kill and 1 block point and Callie Kemohah had 1 point on the lone service ace for the Sooners.

On defense, the Sooners totaled 65 digs in the match, the most this season. Shelton had 14 with Kemohah adding 13. Wilton-LaBoy had 7, Jasmine Ellison 6, and Geissberger and D Ellison had 5. Whitney Wallace and Chamberlain had 4, Sydney Thompson had 3 and Gibson and Martin had 2. Wilton-LaBoy picked up 38 assist in 3.5 sets with Chamberlain added 20 in 1.5 sets. Kemohah had 5 assists. Chamberlain started the match but Wilton-LaBoy entered in the 2nd set and Chamberlain did not play again. At the end of the match she was sitting on the bench and had head phones on. Her knee is obviously not improving much as the the season wears on.

In the match the Sooners had 47 errors - 17 kills errors, 18 service errors and 10 others. Tulsa had 40 errors - 28 kill errors, 6 service errors and 6 others. The Sooners tallied 87.0 earned points in the match compared to 62.0 earned points for Tulsa. It is unusual that 25.0 more earned points results in only outscoring the other team by 7 -> 105 points for Oklahoma in the match to 98 for Tulsa.

Here is the Sooner staff writers article about the comeback win for the Sooners on Friday night.

https://soonersports.com/news/2024/9/13 ... erse-sweep

Congratulations to the Sooners on their two wins this weekend.

The Sooners are now 5-1 on the season. They will be in Manhattan, KS next weekend for matches with UC Santa Barbara and Kansas State on Friday and Sunday. UC SB is 2-6 with two matches left to play this weekend and K-State is 2-4 with two matches left to play this weekend. Seven of those 10 losses have been to ranked teams however.

Boomer Sooner!