(Ran into GopherVBallRocks reader R.S. today at the Laughing Waters Bluegrass Festival. He mentioned reading my account of the Stanford match, but said he hadn’t seen Maureen’s photo with the team, because R.S. only reads the first bullet. Come on folks, scroll down to SUPERFAN AT THE FAIR to see the photo.
Gophs over #1 Ranked Texas, 22-25, 25-19, 25-20, 13-25, 15-7!!! My apologies to GopherVBallRocks readers, I clearly underestimated this team when I said it would be encouraging if our Gophs could win one set each against #5 Stanford and #1 Texas. I had also suggested that our #18 rating was “about right” (implying that I didn’t think the Gophs were a top-ten team). We should be now.
I also underestimated Shaffmaster, Hanson, Palabiyik & Minatee: Shaffmaster – I said last year that Shaffmaster was the best clutch player on the team, and yet I was comfortable with the idea that it was time to move on to freshman Stella Swenson, who I think might be a better pure setter. But the multi-tool Shaffmaster was the MVP of tonights’ match, with 44 assists, 6 kills, 4 aces (only 1 service error), 1 block, and at least 3 miraculous saves; giving her 84 assists, 10 kills, 7 aces, and 3 blocks for the weekend, vs two top-5 teams. The FS1 announcers said that Standford’s Miner was the best setter in the country (and she might be), but Miner doesn’t fill up the scorecard like Shaffmaster can. Hanson – When Freshman Alex Acevedo outplayed Hanson in last week’s exhibition match vs Iowa State, I speculated that Hanson’s role as our #2 Left-side might be in jeopardy; and I complimented her on “keeping up” with Wooker in yesterday’s 5-set loss to Stanford. But Hanson was Shaffmaster’s # 1 weapon tonight, with 19 kills, including 3 from the back-row, and 2 dinks. (The first successful dinks of her Gopher career?) Palabiyik – In yesterday’s post, re the Stanford loss, I noted that “Palabiyik had some terrific digs, but” was victimized at serve-receive, and speculated that D.S. Kate Thibault might challenge Palabiyik for the off-color jersey. Not tonight; Palabiyik had terrific dig after terrific dig, and received well enough that Texas stopped serving at her. Minatee – I’ve been saying all winter and spring that our Middles were weak, and, though I may not have written this, I thought Owoleye was closer to adequate than Minatee. But Minatee showed up big-time against Texas, with 8 kills (all on slides) and 4 blocks (at least a couple against reigning National Player of the Year Avery Skinner). If she can play like that consistently, we’re not as weak as I thought.
SET 1 was close all the way. We never led by more than 1 point, but we were tied 4-4, 10-10, and 16-16, and pulled within 1 at 22-23 before losing the last 2 points. SET 2 started tight, tied 9-9, and then the Gophers jumped out to 20-14 (no one player, that I recall, a team effort), and hung on to tie the match. SET 3 was all Gophers, 9-5 14-8 and 20-14, coasting to victory. SET 4 was disastrous. After a strong 6-2 start, Texas won 23 of the next 30 points to force a 5th set. It was hard not to think about yesterday’s loss to Stanford, where the Gophers led 2 sets to one, got crushed in Set 4, and got off to a slow start in the deciding set. But tonight’s SET 5 was very different. Shaffmaster served the Gophs (2 of her 4 aces) to a 5-0 lead – and Texas couldn’t stop us.
I hate to criticize anything in such a marvelous weekend, but if you want to find flaws, here are some Issues to consider:
- Three times yesterday, Stanford’s Jordyn Harvey exploited the Gopher serve -receive issues, with runs of at least 5 points. Texas didn’t seem to have a server as effective as Harvey, but by Set 4, they had decided to pick on Wooker – and Wooker did not meet the challenge.
- We cut our service errors almost in half (23 vs Stanford, 13 vs Texas) but our ace-to-error ratio for the weekend was 16 to 36; with Wooker a dismal 4 to 11
- In these first two matches, (not counting 1 overpass-kill each) Minatee has had 11 kills, and all 11 were on slides, zero quicks. And Owoleye has had 7 kills, 6 on quicks and 1 slide. As we get into the Big Ten Season, teams are going to scout that.
- Tonight’s Set 4 collapse came mostly with the Gophers in our weak rotation — the one with Wooker hitting out-of-position at Right-side, and Grote hitting out-of-position at Left-side. There is no easy way to avoid this as one of our 12 half-rotations, but we have to find a way to generate some offense here.
But let’s rub it in while we can, the #18 Gophers played two matches, in Milwaukee, vs the #5 & #1 teams in the country, and came away 1 & 1 (5 & 5 in sets). The #3 Badgers played the same two teams, in the same arena (last I looked, Milwaukee is in Wisconsin), and came out 0 & 2 (2 & 6 in sets).
NEXT UP:
Gophers at Baylor on Friday, 7:00
Gophers at TCU on Saturday, 4:00
Both matches on ESPN +