In what is starting to look like a pattern, our Gophers lost in 4 sets, 28-26, 20-25, 18-25,22-25, to #22 ranked Pepperdine. The Gophs first loss of the season, to #1 Texas at Texas, in 4, wasn’t televised here, but the scores were close, so I figured no shame in that. Then last Sunday, they lost to Stanford in 4 at the Pav. I didn’t think the Gophers played especially well against Stanford, but the a couple days later Stanford won in 4 at Lincoln – so maybe Stanford’s really good. And now tonight we lose to Pepperdine at the Pav. It’s not like Pepperdine is a bad team, they’re nationally ranked. But a week ago the Gophs were ranked #3 nationally, and I heard a quote from the Stanford coach rating the Gophers as have the most powerful offense in the country. We shouldn’t lose to Pepperdine at home.
ENCOURAGING SIGN # 1
Some readers have been wondering why I keep writing about McKenna Wucherer (pronounced Wooker), who hasn’t even dressed for the Gophers first 6 matches. A) She was the #1 rated recruit in the country, & B) I thought she looked like a the #1 rated recruit in the country during last Spring’s exhibition matches.
Last week McKenna was on the bench wearing a “boot” on her foot; tonight she was a starting Left-Side Hitter. And she started off great with 4 kills in Set 1, including 2 kills leading the Gophs to an 11-6 early lead. She did not play back-row or serve.
ENCOURAGING SIGN # 2
I’ve been begging for Setter Melani Shaffmaster to attack more balls, and she did tonight. I had her with 4 kills, including one for set-point in Set 1!
SO WHAT’S WRONG WITH OUR GOPHS?
- Though Pepperdine outhit the Gophers, 64 kills at a .279 clip, to 50 kills at .204, it was the “floor game” where the Gophs were really outplayed. The Gophs had 4 aces (8 for Pepperdine), but it felt like 90% of the Pepperdine serve-receives resulted in a perfect pass to their setter. Not the case for the Gopher receives. Pepperdine also saved 20 or 30 near-kills by the Gophs, vs 5 or 6 saves for the Gophs.
- So far this season, Coach McCutcheon has been using Taylor Landfair all 6 rotations. This makes her an obvious target for opposing servers (Landfair being the Gophs big weapon, they want to make her work hard in the back row), and she has been struggling a little with her receives. The advantage of keeping Landfair in across the back row is that she can attack from the back row. But the tradeoff didn’t work tonight, as the Gophers had zero back-row kills. TLandfair had 4 back-row kills against Stanford and 9 against Oregon, but zero against Pepperdine despite multiple attempts. A couple of the failed attempts were due to poor sets, so not necessarily Landfair’s fault. But that’s sort of beside the point; Landfair made at least 3 service-receive errors vs zero back-row kills – so the trade-off didn’t work tonight.
- And Landfair, who brings the phrase “shock & awe” to mind when she unloads on a good set, is too timid, for my taste, when the set isn’t perfect. Landfair has the potential to be every bit as good as Steph Samedy was; the difference, so far, is that Samedy wasn’t afraid to attack a poor set.
- The Gophers are not getting enough offense from anywhere but left-side. I had Landfair with 16 kills and Wucherer with 13, out of 50. And 7 from Wenaas, but no back-row success and minimal success from our Middles. McCutcheon started Husemann and Gros, subbed Booth in for Gros to start Set 3, eventually subbed Davis in for Husemann, then went back to Husemann – but none were consistently effective. (Gros was especially unsuccessful on “slides.”)
- Nor were our Middles blocking. I had Pepperdine‘s #10 with 21 kills, and it felt like 19 of them were “power-angle” blasts. Defending against “power-angle” attacks is the job of the Middle Blocker, but our Middles are consistently failing to “close the block,” i.e., getting their hands close to our outside blocker’s hands – leaving a gap for the opposing “power-angle” blasts. The big freshman, Carter Booth, has proven particularly slow in closing the block, and Husemann seems not strong physically strong enough to block “power-angle” blasts, even when she does get there.
- Nor are we getting much offense from our Right-Side Hitter, or “Opposite.” Freshman Julia Hanson had an impressive 14 kills against Texas, but minimal impact in other matches, and she hasn’t blocked well. Red-shirt Freshman Lauren Crowl has blocked a little better, but hasn’t generated much offense. Tonight’s insertion of the Freshman Wucherer bumped Jenna Wenaas to Right-side (and Hanson and Crowl to the bench –neither played at all), and I’m guessing, at least for now, that this night be the plan going forward). But Wenaas hit.069 for the match. So maybe Wucherer at Left and Wenaas at Right isn’t the answer. It certainly wasn’t tonight.
- And, contrary to the opinions of some GopherVBallRocks readers, I think the Gophs are not serving aggressively enough! Or at least not at the right time. Wenaas, the team’s only jump-server for example, had 3 service errors tonight, including one when the score was 25-25. (Exactly when I’d want her to back-off a bit and get it in.) Then in Sets 3 & 4, which Pepperdine led all the way, often by a substantial margin, which is when I’d want my servers to get aggressive because you need a spark, Wenaas was serving lollipops, which Pepperdine was teeing up for kills. (Here’s a statistic that might interest the “just put the damn ball in play” crowd: when Stanford beat Nebraska, in Lincoln, a couple nights ago, Stanford, the winning team, had 23 service errors!)
I’ve got some ideas what the Gophs need to do different, but I’ll keep that to myself until after Washington State, an unranked team for a change, plays at the Pav Saturday Night. One way or the other, the Gophs need to get these problems solved before starting the grueling Big Ten Season next Friday at Purdue.
R.I.P.J.D.