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Post by elliotberton on Nov 30, 2023 23:06:53 GMT -5
Just finished up watching on demand - which is one positive thing about ESPN+. I thought Yale's middles were not all that good. So our hitters could go cross court and score. That won't happen as much tomorrow. Agree with those who have questioned the passing. Overall below the standard of what will be needed.
Still, I am hopeful that the Ladies will do what is needed to get a win in round two. Will be curious to see how the Kansas home crowd compares with Rec Hall.
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Post by traveler on Dec 1, 2023 8:12:59 GMT -5
Venue seats just above 2200 I have heard — size of my HS gym. So they may fill it but I don’t see it as intimidating. Omaha exposed some KS weaknesses — taking set 3 to extra points — although they most def have some talent. BTW Toy Onabanjo if she looks familiar it’s because she’s a transfer from IA.
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Post by elliotberton on Dec 1, 2023 8:51:50 GMT -5
Venue seats just above 2200 I have heard — size of my HS gym. So they may fill it but I don’t see it as intimidating. Omaha exposed some KS weaknesses — taking set 3 to extra points — although they most def have some talent. BTW Toy Onabanjo if she looks familiar it’s because she’s a transfer from IA. Sometimes intimate crowds can be pretty loud and intense. It looked like the stands are close to the floor - like Rec Hall. So the home crowd could be a factor. |
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Dec 1, 2023 8:53:51 GMT -5
Cam was obviously not in her groove in all areas. It's like a team losing a star wide receiver. You have to make adjustments in a hurry, and they did going inside more. And they were more calculating in their serves. Yale made some good adjustments in the second set. I give them credit. They aren't middle of the pack hacks. Stellar record. We also made adjustments, put our foot on the gas, and set #3 and #4 are the results. The machine wins again.
The hill really gets steep now.
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Post by seeyajohn on Dec 1, 2023 10:26:43 GMT -5
I'm not necessarily saying they let the foot off the gas, but, numerous times this season, PSU has had a good 1st set and then the 2nd set sucked. I think that a large part of it is the serve receive. As Seeyajohn mentioned, Starck needed to come in for Cam for serve receive. Whatever it is, it needs to be fixed. I think that part of it is Mac also. She isn't that consistent. The middle connection is sometimes there and sometimes not. Mac seems to have a good connection with Taylor more than Allie. Allie has hit much better in the prior two years than this year. Serve receive is a problem. It has been all season. A bigger problem is that we seem to take the wrong medicine for our problems. When our passing outsides struggle, we sub out the wrong one, and our best passing outside from last season hasn’t been in serve receive all year. I give up. To what "passing outside" are you referring? |
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Post by nittanye on Dec 1, 2023 12:53:34 GMT -5
Serve receive is a problem. It has been all season. A bigger problem is that we seem to take the wrong medicine for our problems. When our passing outsides struggle, we sub out the wrong one, and our best passing outside from last season hasn’t been in serve receive all year. I give up. To what "passing outside" are you referring? I'm a little confused by the comment, too. I interpreted the comment as meaning that a "passing outside" was an OH used in serve receive. Hannah is that one that got subbed out, and she referred to the OH position being "new to [her]" in the Maryland post-match interview, which makes me think she hasn't done a lot of SR. KSC shifts the back row when Hannah is in to minimize her exposure in passing situations, but she's definitely improved from the start of the season to now. She looks much more fluid and confident, but seemed to catch a case of the yips before getting subbed out vs. Yale. As far as subbing out "the wrong one", I assume (?) this is proposing that they should have taken Mruzik out instead. While I agree she's shanked a few balls this season, I don't think taking a first-team All B1G OH out is warranted. Especially given how good she's been overall. See here: www.volleydork.com/post/conference-postseason-honors-2023The best "passing outside" from last year was obviously Starck, who is technically an OH but has been playing DS for the past 2 seasons because she is a very good passer, especially for someone >6ft tall. I hope they weren't referring to Markley as the best "passing outside" because passing is probably one of the biggest things that seems to keep her off the court. |
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Post by ethankasales on Dec 1, 2023 13:24:38 GMT -5
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Post by ethankasales on Dec 1, 2023 13:29:02 GMT -5
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Post by ethankasales on Dec 1, 2023 13:43:22 GMT -5
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96psu
Sophomore
Posts: 65
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Post by 96psu on Dec 1, 2023 15:25:51 GMT -5
I give up. To what "passing outside" are you referring? I'm a little confused by the comment, too. I interpreted the comment as meaning that a "passing outside" was an OH used in serve receive. Hannah is that one that got subbed out, and she referred to the OH position being "new to [her]" in the Maryland post-match interview, which makes me think she hasn't done a lot of SR. KSC shifts the back row when Hannah is in to minimize her exposure in passing situations, but she's definitely improved from the start of the season to now. She looks much more fluid and confident, but seemed to catch a case of the yips before getting subbed out vs. Yale. As far as subbing out "the wrong one", I assume (?) this is proposing that they should have taken Mruzik out instead. While I agree she's shanked a few balls this season, I don't think taking a first-team All B1G OH out is warranted. Especially given how good she's been overall. See here: www.volleydork.com/post/conference-postseason-honors-2023The best "passing outside" from last year was obviously Starck, who is technically an OH but has been playing DS for the past 2 seasons because she is a very good passer, especially for someone >6ft tall. I hope they weren't referring to Markley as the best "passing outside" because passing is probably one of the biggest things that seems to keep her off the court. Mostly correct, but I’ll try to clarify. By “passing outside” I mean the front row hitter who is back in serve receive. Starck has played as a DS, for the last two seasons, so no, I was not referring to her. Hannah has been mostly protected from that role as a DS is usually in for the RS in 2 of her 3 rotations, and therefore she doesn’t have the pressure of serve receive that Jess does. Markley was the passing OH last season, and Kash was similarly protected or DS’d for. Markley passed all three rotations she played across the front and I don’t recall her serve receive ever being an issue, nor did it affect her ability to get on the court. She’s more than capable. I don’t have access to the stats some of you do, but I remember last season our Libero was targeted in serve receive, more than our DSs and OHs. This season, our OHs have been targeted and last night they struggled in serve receive. In my opinion, Hannah’s issues last night weren’t worthy of taking her arm out of the game, and save for a brief moment when the entirety of our receive was flailing to start the third set, she passed well. Yes, I was suggesting there should have been other substitutions made to improve the part of the match Yale was exploiting. We have an army of capable players who can pass a ball and when people are struggling, changes are slow to be made. That’s been an issue for this coaching staff all season, and as the tournament goes on and the margin for error gets slimmer, leaving a player, or players, on the court who is struggling makes less and less sense no matter how good they are or what accolades that have accrued. |
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Post by nittanye on Dec 1, 2023 16:40:46 GMT -5
I'm a little confused by the comment, too. I interpreted the comment as meaning that a "passing outside" was an OH used in serve receive. Hannah is that one that got subbed out, and she referred to the OH position being "new to [her]" in the Maryland post-match interview, which makes me think she hasn't done a lot of SR. KSC shifts the back row when Hannah is in to minimize her exposure in passing situations, but she's definitely improved from the start of the season to now. She looks much more fluid and confident, but seemed to catch a case of the yips before getting subbed out vs. Yale. As far as subbing out "the wrong one", I assume (?) this is proposing that they should have taken Mruzik out instead. While I agree she's shanked a few balls this season, I don't think taking a first-team All B1G OH out is warranted. Especially given how good she's been overall. See here: www.volleydork.com/post/conference-postseason-honors-2023The best "passing outside" from last year was obviously Starck, who is technically an OH but has been playing DS for the past 2 seasons because she is a very good passer, especially for someone >6ft tall. I hope they weren't referring to Markley as the best "passing outside" because passing is probably one of the biggest things that seems to keep her off the court. Mostly correct, but I’ll try to clarify. By “passing outside” I mean the front row hitter who is back in serve receive. Starck has played as a DS, for the last two seasons, so no, I was not referring to her. Hannah has been mostly protected from that role as a DS is usually in for the RS in 2 of her 3 rotations, and therefore she doesn’t have the pressure of serve receive that Jess does. Markley was the passing OH last season, and Kash was similarly protected or DS’d for. Markley passed all three rotations she played across the front and I don’t recall her serve receive ever being an issue, nor did it affect her ability to get on the court. She’s more than capable. I don’t have access to the stats some of you do, but I remember last season our Libero was targeted in serve receive, more than our DSs and OHs. This season, our OHs have been targeted and last night they struggled in serve receive. In my opinion, Hannah’s issues last night weren’t worthy of taking her arm out of the game, and save for a brief moment when the entirety of our receive was flailing to start the third set, she passed well. Yes, I was suggesting there should have been other substitutions made to improve the part of the match Yale was exploiting. We have an army of capable players who can pass a ball and when people are struggling, changes are slow to be made. That’s been an issue for this coaching staff all season, and as the tournament goes on and the margin for error gets slimmer, leaving a player, or players, on the court who is struggling makes less and less sense no matter how good they are or what accolades that have accrued. But Markley has almost never been used in serve receive. Like Hannah, I understand she played mostly RS in HS and club so she wasn't a super strong passer coming in. She only received 74 serves in all of 2022 and had a Rec% of 0.878 according to PSU's stats. Mruzik has received 590 serves this season with a Rec% of 0.953. Last year, PSU didn't actually use an OH in serve receive at all. This is why they ran out of subs in a few high-profile matches (at UW for example) when the match went to extra points. Last year, the leaders in total serve receives were: Bilinovic (L) - 730, 0.974 Grimes (DS) - 517, 0.973 Starck (DS) - 458, 0.930 Kuerschen (DS) - 404, 0.965 Williams (OH1) - 79, 0.861 Markley (OH2) - 74, 0.878 This season: Mruzik (OH): 590, 0.953 Grimes (L): 475, 0.964 Bilinovic (DS): 330, 0.973 Starck (DS/OH): 266, 0.955 Kuerschen (DS): 139, 0.942 Hannah (OH): 72, 0.903 Note: error rate is way to simplified of a stat to look at passing, but I don't have access to advanced passing stats. I agree that the passing wasn't great yesterday (Mac was out past the 10ft line all night, which I think is why Mruzik was forced to tip or go off-speed on so many shots). But Mruzik has had a better season passing than any non-defensive players on the team, and Hannah is a bit of an experiment at OH at the moment, so the substitution choice made total sense to me based on performance data. |
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96psu
Sophomore
Posts: 65
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Post by 96psu on Dec 1, 2023 17:14:43 GMT -5
If only it were that simple, right? Error rate doesn’t tell you anything about the quality of the pass, only if the receiver was aced. You left out errors per set, which Starck and Mruzik have led by nearly double over all other passers in respective seasons. Starck has improved that metric greatly year over year. The number of receptions tells you more about who the opponent targets (they game plan where the weak link is), but you also have to consider that a 6 rotation player who passes all 6 rotations can be targeted more, so again, numbers don’t tell the whole story. Coaching is about giving your team the best chance to win, and using stats is only part of the equation. Maybe that’s where you start, but you have to be able to make adjustments during the game when things aren’t going your way.
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Post by elliotberton on Dec 2, 2023 10:48:49 GMT -5
This is a fascinating discussion and I thank both 96psu and nittanye for having it. My two cents-volleyball statistics are more arbitrary than those in other sports, and what constitutes a "perfect" pass (a stat that we see in the pro game) is always subjective. But the statistics are still the only way to compare the performance of players. So whomever is assigned to be an official scorer and make judgments (why isn't an over pass counted as an attack? is it also a dig?) is providing us with a valuable tool to assist with what is otherwise an entirely subjective evaluation.
What I do know is that the coaches (everywhere) want to succeed even more than we fans (supporters). All of the coaches (again, not just ours) have played and studied the game, and are able to evaluate the performance of the players on a higher level that can we. In addition, what the staff can see, and we cannot, is how well the players are performing in practice, know how these students respond to adversity, criticism, and success. So, whenever I get frustrated with a player, or a coach's decision, I find that I must give the paid professionals the benefit of the doubt. In this situation, the decision to sub Cam out of serve recieve might have been partly motivated by concern for how her passing might affect other parts of her game - or possibly to ease the burden on other players who were covering for Cam (taking a larger receive zone).
I do appreciate the passion of the fans, and second guessing coaching decisions is always fun. But in the end, Coaches who don't meet expectations "mutually part ways" with their employer-so we must assume that there is more than meets the eye (test).
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