Month: November 2022

J.S. writes: “Beating Wisconsin or Nebraska in the course of a season is big; this year we’ve done both! This was the Gopher team that we had expected to see at the beginning of the season.  Solid defense with interspersed with ruthless, dominating, high speed, and almost savage offensive runs.  

It was interesting watching John Cook’s face throughout the match.  He alternated between looks of anger and shock – not quite sure what was happening to his team — a sign he’d been out coached by Hugh. Nebraska suffered some significant losses due to injury, but they’re deep in talent; they shouldn’t have lost to both of Wisconsin and us at home. Their game plan had been dissembled in advance by the superior Gopher coaching.

I loved that Minnesota got to give them their first 2-match-loss-season-ender-at-home in program history. After an inconsistent offensive year for the Gophers, this was a perfect ending against a worthy opponent. That should weigh heavy on the minds of the Nebraska players going into the NCAA tournament.”

JOHN: I wouldn’t under-estimate the loss of the Husker’s brilliant defensive spec./libero Kenzie Knuckles; she’s very important to Nebraska.

R.A. Writes: First, Wow! And … Landfair is an enigma.  She carried the team with Samedy-worthy performance vs OSU, hitting with authority all night. She started the same vs Neb, hitting an unbelievable.900 in Set 1 (9 kills on 10 attempts with no errors). But hit a combined .000 in Sets 2-3 (6 K and 6 errors on 23 attempts), with too many dinks, as John noted. What happened to her?  She had several receiving errors, did these break her concentration or confidence?  If Landfair plays like OSU/Neb Set 1, we get a deep NCAA run. If not, we’ll lose to teams we should beat. 

Booth carried us in Sets 2-3, hitting .636 (7 of 11 with no errors) plus 8 blocks. I don’t have BTN, so I followed the match on the crappy Neb stat page, and I think we almost blew Set 2 when Neb went on 10-2 run with Booth on the bench. I assume her blocking intimidated the Huskers and led to their .153 hitting for the match. Coach, please leave Booth in.  Overall … YAY GOPHERS!”

JOHN: Jerry Reed was talking about craps when he said ‘When you’re hot, you’re hot (and when you’re not, you’re not.’)

But he could have been talking about volleyball. Momentum is huge in volleyball, as it is in most fast-paced sports. (Baseball is paced so slowly as to defy momentum.) When I was coaching, I tried to coach my teams to forget the last play and focus 100% on the next one – but I don’t know that I ever succeeded. It’s a hard thing to do.

I think even R.A. understands that the rules require the  teams to rotate, meaning that after 3 front-row rotations, Booth is exiled to the back-row for 3 rotations. I don’t think Booth is as skilled a back-row player as Landfair; and even if she was, back-row players are not allowed to block.

R.N. writes: “Big win for the Gophers, and they  earned it!
I was anticipating a Nebraska service error to end the third set — just like the first two sets. But no, the Huskers made the Gophers win it the old fashioned way.”

JOHN: Better yet, match point came on a kill from Wooker – who had struggled all match. 

G.H. writes: “We are out of town with no BTN, so we enjoyed getting your recap.  Look forward to seeing the NCAA seeding.”

JOHN: Where were you, G.H., in Mongolia? GopherVBallRocks has readers in Boca Raton, Phoenix, Ely and London who watch or stream the matches on BTN.

THE ROAD TO OMAHA

Does go through Austin. The Gophers got what is essentially the #8 overall seed. The road looks like this:

• Next Friday at the Pav: S.E. Louisiana;
• Saturday at the Pav: the winner of Florida St vs Iowa State;
• Sweet 16, at Austin, likely #9 seed Ohio State; and
• Elite 8, at Austin, likely #1 overall seed – Texas.
• You can find the full brackets at ncaa.com/live-updates/volleyball-women/d1/live-updates-2022-di-womens-volleyball

The downside of the #8 seed is having to play the Texas at Texas. But if the Gophs are going to win the National Championship, we will likely have to beat Texas eventually. We lost to Texas at Texas back in August, but it was a close match, 21-25, 18-25, 25-23, 22-25, without Wooker. (Julia Hanson had a big night), actually outhitting the Longhorns .250 to .230 in a 4-set loss. The Gophers are better now – the Longhorns probably are too.

And once we reach the Sweet 16, whoever we play is going to be tough. I have to say I look forward to a rubber match with the Buckeyes if both teams get that far; they kicked our butts back in October, but backing into the NCAAs on a 4-match losing streak, 3 of them on their home court, doesn’t bode well for the Buckeyes.

But first we have to take care of business next weekend. The Lady Lions of S.E.LA. are also coming in hot, off their first Southland Conference Tournament Championship. Their overall record of 25 & 7 is slightly better than ours – but from what I can see, their season has not include a single match against an NCAA tournament team.

Iowa State comes in with an unimpressive record of 19 & 11 (10 & 6 in the Big 12). BUT (a big but) the Cylones are the only team this season to defeat Texas! Florida State comes in with an equally  unimpressive record of 19 & 10 (12 & 2 in the ACC). The Seminoles played several NCAA teams, but they don’t seem to have beaten any of them. For the record, I have the Gophs at 9 & 7 against the NCAA field, and 6 & 5 against the top 16 seeds; but the Gopher team we saw in Columbus and Lincoln this weekend was way better than that.

During the “Spring Season,” I was reassured that Landfair was healthy, I got a glimpse of star freshmen Wooker, Booth and Hanson (the most impressive of the 3 last Spring), and I thought “This is a Final Four Team.” Going into the fall season, I told you that the Gophers were better than the Badgers. And this theory was reinforced when we swept the Sconies at the Pav. (The Badgers just won their 4^th straight Big Ten Title.)

Then we lost to Northwestern (who finished tied for 10^th place), in 5 sets, at the Pav – the absolute low point of the season. For the match, we out-hit NW .216 to .167, and out-blocked them 15 to 12. But, especially in the sets NW won, they served aggressively and effectively, keeping the Gophers out of system. But even then I said that the important part of the season is in December.

The Stanford coach, after beating us, said the Gophers as have the most powerful offense in the country. BTN announcer after BTN announcer note that “Everyone knows to can’t stop the Gopher-Hitting-Machine if you allow them to play in-system.” Not even Texas is going to out-play Landfair, Wooker, Wenaas, Booth and company at the net – but even S.E. Louisiana will be a threat if they serve better than we receive.

In straight sets! 25-22, 25-23, 25-22 — at Lincoln where we almost never win. We needed to win a match this weekend, and I thought we had a 50-50 chance to get one. I thought it unlikely that we would win both, I would have thought it highly unlikely that we would have won at Lincoln in straight sets, and I would never guessed that we would have lost only 1 set all weekend!

HOW DID WE DO IT? As I reported, last night’s match at OSU was sideout-sideout-sideout, with the occasional 2 or 3 point run. Tonight was the opposite of that.

• Set 1: The 6:00 BTN match (Wisconsin beat OSU in 4) ran long; we were down 9-15 when we got the feed but I don’t know how. it happened. Soon after we were down 11-19; pretty grim. Then (I think with MvGraw, Kilkelly and Wenaas serving), the Gophers went on a 13-2 run to take a 24-22 lead, eventually getting set point on a Nebraska service error.
• Set 2: With the Gophers and Huskers furiously trading service errors, the scores stayed close until the Gophers went on a 6-0 run, eventually getting another set point on a Nebraska service error.
• Set 3: After jumping out to a 6-2 lead, the Gophers went through a 2-12 freeze, falling behind 8-14. Then the Gophers snapped out of it with their own 16-5 run to regain the lead at 24-19, eventually getting match point on a rare kill by McKenna Wooker.

MORE ABOUT THE SERVICE ERRORS: The Gopher made 9, distributed among everyone except McGhie. I know this drives some of my readers crazy; one in particular, by Landfair serving at 24-20, drove me crazy. But the Huskers out-did us with 10 service errors. Are the Huskers just stupid? No. At the end of Set 1, following the Gophs amazing comeback, the BTN announcer noted that the Husker servers were allowing the Gophers to play in-system, and everyone knows you can’t stop the Gophs when they’re in-system. The Nebraska coaches must have had the same thought, because the Huskers came out serving very aggressively. And it didn’t work.

MORE ABOUT WOOKER’S INEFFECTIVENESS: Wooker had 10 kills last night in Columbus, but only 3 tonight in Lincoln, vs 3 errors, in 19 attempts. Athletes have off-nights, Landfair had one last week against Rutgers, and Wooker’s a freshman. But here’s another possibility. Most teams play a 5-1, meaning that in half of the rotations, the blocker opposite our left-side hitter is a setter. But Nebraska plays a 6-2, meaning that they always have a “real” blocker opposite our left-side hitter. This didn’t bother the 6-5 Landfair much, she led the Gophs with 15 kills (I thought even Landfair tried too many dinks). But the bigger blocker might have been what slowed Wooker down.  

A FINAL THOUGHT: Before the season started, I told you this was a really good team, a Final Four Team, maybe. The dream is back!

NEXT UP: The NCAA Tournament. The NCAA selection show will be broadcast at 6:30 on ESPNU. In case you miss it, I’ll send it out. With the sweep this weekend, we should move up into a 6 to 8 seed. My thought – it would be nice not to have to go to Austin or Madison for the Regions.

READERS RESPOND TO WIN OVER OHIO STATE:

R.A. writes: Landfair flipped a switch and became a different player.  She took charge, hit with authority and was reasonable on serve-receive, scored without matched errors.  How? Why? Can she do it again?   A repeat would give us a chance against NE, not a straight-set loss.  Booth had another stellar night.  I’m confident in her.  Glad we get to host some NCAAs.

In 4 sets, 20-25, 25-21, 25-21, 26-24, earning an away & away split with the suddenly slumping Buckeyes. Tonight’s loss to the Gophers dropped OSU to 15 & 4, with 3 of their losses coming in their last 3 matches. (Plus a 5-set early loss at Nebraska.)

Tonight’s match was similar to the Buckeye win at the Pav (20-25, 21-25, 22-25) in that not only were the set-scores close, each set was close all the way. This was epitomized by Set 4, which was tied at 7-7, 11-11, 14-14, 18-18 and 24-24; the Gophers enjoyed 3-pt lead early, but never trailed by more than 2. The team hitting and blocking numbers for the match were basically even, but the Gophers had 5 aces (none for OSU), with 4 of them coming in Set 3.

I said previously that we needed to win one of these two tough matches this weekend to guarantee a top 16 seed for the NCAAs. (We came into the weekend #9 in the polls and #13 on the RPI; two more losses would have put us on the bubble for a top 16.)  A 16 seed is critical because it usually means we’ll host the first two rounds. And in the Gophers 27^th match of the season, the Gophers got their first big road win. After starting the Big Ten with 1 win & 2 losses, the Gophers have won 13 of their last 16 last Big Ten matches.

Taylor Landfair, after an off-day last Sunday against Rutgers, led the Gophs with 25 kills. (And I thought she looked okay on serve-receive.) Carter Booth had 13 kills and 7 blocks, and I had Arica Davis with 6 kills and 3 blocks, so a decent night for our Middles. Wooker had 10 kills and Wenaas 8, but both were a little streaky; Wenaas had zero kills in our Set 1 loss, but was effective later; and Wooker played well early and late, but went cold during a stretch early in Set 4. McGraw was brilliant as always.

Tonight’s win takes the pressure off for tomorrow night’s season-finale at Lincoln. The Gophers have clenched a top-16 seed, and even a win tomorrow won’t earn us a top-4 seed. But momentum going into the NCAAs is helpful, and a win might earn the Gophs a 5 to 7 seed vs a 10 to 12 seed if we lose. Wisconsin, with tonight’s win at Nebraska, clenched their 4^th straight Big Ten Title; their only loss at the Pav – in straight sets.

If you’re watching tomorrow night’s match (8:00, BTN), notice that Nebraska plays a 6-2, i.e., they alternate two setters, always in the back row, which lets them use two big opposites, meaning slightly more offense and slightly better blocking. This could be a bigger advantage than usual on the second night of a brutal back-to-back weekend. Watch to see if Shaffmaster or Landfair looks tired. Eagan’s Kennedi Orr is one of 3 setters Nebraska uses.

G.U. writes: “It appears the Gophs need someone watching the replays on TV and reporting to the bench.  McCutcheon had no business using his last challenge as the Penn St. player was 3 inches behind the line when she left the floor for that kill.”

JOHN: American pro sports has seen an explosion in the size of coaching staffs:

• In addition to a hitting coach and a base-running coach, the Twins staff now includes a “Run Production Coach.”
• In addition to a pitching coach, an infield coach, and an outfield coach, the Twins staff now includes a “Run Prevention Coach.”
•  The NBA’s Utah Jazz, with a 15-man roster limit, have a coaching staff (not counting Traveling Secretaries, Equipment Managers, Trainers, etc) of 12 coaches! Perfect for that one-on-one attention.
• The Vikings (with 29 full-time coaches, they do not lead the league) who dress 2 quarterbacks for each game, have a “Quarterbacks Coach,” and an “Assistant Quarterbacks Coach.”
• The Vikings employ an “Interior Linebacker Coach,” an “Exterior Linebacker Coach,” and an “Assistant Linebacker Coach.” 
• And a coach whose primary function is to sit in the booth watching replays, replays not dependent on the network, and advising the head coach when to challenge.

The Gophers seem to have 2 or 3 assistant coaches, but I don’t think they have access to video replays outside of what BTN or BTN+ provides, leaving McCutcheon dependent on his own eyes and his trust in his players. His challenge of that back-row attack proved wrong, and it cost us the potential to challenge a maybe-touch at match-point (no guarantee he would have won that). But he seemed certain, based I think on his own eyes) that the PSU hitter had stepped on the line.

R.A. writes: “John, can you explain why McKenna Wooker doesn’t play 6-rotations? Her serve may not be perfect and she may still be less experienced in back row defense, but her defense can’t be any worse than Landfair or Kilkelly.

Hockey has +/- ratings for players based on goals scored both ways when they’re on the ice. Applying that logic to volleyball, points earned minus points lost on errors, I regard Landfair as a liability. Her constant poor receives take the Gophers out-of-system even if they’re not scored as receiving errors. I respect McCuthcheon’s coaching record, so I’m flummoxed by these seeming inconsistencies. What am I missing?”

JOHN: I can’t read McCutcheon’s mind, and I’m not at the practices watching Wooker receive. Based on the respective heights of these two top recruits, 6-1 vs 6-5, I would expect Wooker to be a better receiver than Landfair, but based on the very small sample we’ve seen in live-action, she doesn’t seem to be. Being only one-person trying to observe everything for this blog, I have not been able to track every serve-receive – instead only tracking the totally failed receives (and maybe not even all of those). Looking at my notes from the last 7 matches vs quality opponents (not including Iowa or Rutgers) I have Landfair with 20 back-row kills vs 18 totally failed receives – so her presence in the back-row is pretty much a wash.

R.A. continues: “Further, Wooker is the only player who consistently kills with authority.  She contributes as much in limited time as Wenaas overall or Landfair. And only a fraction of Landfair’s shots are delivered with authority.  As you’ve observed, she only really attacks perfect sets.”

JOHN: According to the official Gopher season stats:

• Wooker: 157 kills, minus 58 errors, on 385 attempts = .257.
• Wenaas: 225 kills, minus 88 errors, on 622 attempts = .220
• Landfair: 403 kills, minus 142 errors, on 1040 attempts=.251
• But raw stats can mislead; Wooker’s a freshman, and she’s been injured, Wenaas has been playing Opposite half the time – not her natural position..

R.A. again: “Booth’s and Wooker’s performances continue to bode well for next year.”

CRITICAL FINAL WEEKEND

The schedule, set months in advance, has the Big Ten’s 4 best teams playing each other in back-to-back Friday/Saturday Doubleheaders, with 1^st place Wisconsin (#3 nationally) playing at 2^nd place Nebraska (#5 nationally) and then at 3^rd place Ohio State (#8 nationally), while our 4^th place Gophs (#9 nationally) play at 3^rd place Ohio State and then at 2^nd place Nebraska. This weekend’s matches will determine the Big Ten Championship (the Gophers are out) and the critically-important seeding for the NCAAs (the Gophers are in, somewhere).

Obviously, the schedule-makers did the Badgers and our Gophers no favors. My hunch is that BTN demanded a final weekend like this as the price for broadcasting volleyball at a time when it has to compete for air-time with not only Big Ten football, but also basketball and hockey. (Reader D.U. has questioned why the MN Girl’s H.S. basketball and hockey tournaments are broadcast and the volleyball Tourney is not. A good question.)

A week ago, based on the volleyball I had personally watched, I would have said that then 15 & 1 (in the conf) and 5^th rated Ohio State was the best team in the Big Ten. Then last weekend, the wheels fell off the Buckeye machine and they lost twice: at 11^th place Maryland in 4 sets, and at home, in 5 sets, to 8^th place Indiana. I said before the season started, and continue to believe, that the Badgers were/are overrated; yet they’re 17 & 1 in the conference – their only loss (in 3 sets) at the Pav.

As much as I love the Gophers, and as highly as I value their talent, it is tough to explain how we remain, currently, the 9^th-rated team in the country, with a 18 & 8 record. And it is hard to imagine a 18 & 10 team, should we lose both matches this weekend, getting a top-16 seed. We have “signature wins” over Wisconsin, #12 ranked Florida, and #19 ranked Purdue at the Pav, and a neutral-site win over #17 ranked Baylor. But also “signature losses” to unranked Northwestern and Pepperdine at the Pav, and zero “signature wins” on the road. A win last Friday at Penn St. would have helped, but we let that one get away. I doubt that a top-4 seed is obtainable, even if we win both matches, but a split would guarantee a top-16 seed, likely giving the Gophers home-court advantage in the first two rounds.

Set 3 made Maureen nervous, but the Gophs got it done, 25-11, 25-19, 26-24. The same Maureen that said, after Set 2, “I hope we play some of our subs in the 3^rd.” We did, Julie Hanson. Hanson, who hadn’t played in months (I thought perhaps we were red-shirting her), came in for Landfair (who hadn’t had a great match) — and looked terrible. Landfair eventually came back in.

The Gophers outhit the Scarlett Knights .244 to .099, and out-blocked them 13-4. Rutgers hurt themselves with 11 service errors vs only 1 ace. Booth led the Gophs with 8 kills and 5 blocks, Wooker and Wenaas had 6 &4 and 6 & 3, respectively. Landfair had 4 & 3; she was favoring a calf late at Penn St.; I hope she’s okay.

READERS RESPOND RE LOSS AT PENN ST.

Reader P.A. Asks: “What was your take on the ending? A double challenge??? Seemed frivolous.  And was there a touch on the last point giving set 4 to PSU?  No challenges left to verify. Coaching is tough. Too little too late for Minnie unfortunately.”

JOHN: P.A. refers to a sequence late in Set 4, with the score tied at 25-25, when a Penn St. back-row hitter attacked a ball that, untouched by the Gophers, hit the floor near the back line – and was called out, giving the Gophs a 26-25 lead.

However, Penn St challenged the line call. I watched the replay and thought it too close to over-rule the original call, but the replay ref saw it differently and called it in, giving Penn St the 1-point lead. Then McCutcheon challenged that the back-row hitter had stepped on the 10-ft line – the rare “counter-challenge.” The replay showed that she had been close – but not on the line, keeping the lead with Penn St. And stripping McCutcheon of his last challenge.

The next point, which became match-point, ended with the Gophers hitting a ball past a pair of blockers – and clearly out, but there appeared to be a touch by one of the blockers. McCutcheon argued, but he didn’t have a challenge left!

If the replay official had agreed with me and not overturned the call on the previous play, the Gophers would have been able to challenge the touch on the final play– and if we had won that, as it seemed we should have, then the Gophs would have won Set 4 creating a Set 5 – which the Gopher, who had the momentum, might have won.

I guess P.A, is suggesting that if McCutcheon had not have spent his last challenge on the previous play, he could have won the challenge on the final play. Maybe.

NEXT UP: At Ohio State Friday, at Nebraska Saturday, seeding for the NCAAs on Sunday. More on all 3 later in the week.

But it got away. The Gophers lose to Penn State 17-25, 18-25. 25-20, 25-27.  Once again, bad serve receiving taking the Gophs out of system, neutralizing our offense, was the reason. We outblocked Penn State (slightly) even in a 4-set loss, but couldn’t overcome the inconsistent serve receiving.

I counted at least a dozen failed receives (mostly Landfair, Kilkelly, and for a change, Wenaas) but it was probably more than that. For most of the match, our serve-receive was okay, and during those stretches we played Penn State even or slightly better. But we experienced a 2-13 slump to finish Set 1, an 11-18 slump to finish Set 2, and a 3-7 slump to finish Set 4 – all of these slumps featuring bad serve receiving.

The Gophs were not entirely at full strength. Wooker was dressed, but back from an extended absence, with only two days of practice, didn’t start – Wenaas at Left-side and Crowl at Opposite. Crowl was not effective, and Wooker subbed in in the middle of Set 1. But Wooker had few opportunities in Set 1, and Crowl again started Set 2. Crowl was again ineffective, and Wooker back in. Wooker started Sets 3 & 4, and was very effective, racking up 9 kills in basically 2 sets.

And then late in Set 4, Landfair, who has chronic lower-leg problems, seemed to pull a calf muscle. She stayed on the floor, and even got a couple of late kills, but was limping and clearly not 100%. I had Landfair with 17 kills and 4 blocks. for the match.

We got minimal offensive production from our Middles tonight. Booth played the whole match, and I had her with 4 kills (and 3 blocks). Davis played Sets 1 & 2; I had her with 2 kills (and 3 blocks). After losing 2 sets, McCutcheon went with Gros, who I think of as a stronger Middle than Davis, in Sets 3 & 4, but it didn’t make much difference, I had Gros with 2 kills (and 1 block). To be fair, it’s difficult for Shaffmaster to feed good sets to our Middles when she gets so few good passes.

Wenaas, though struggling more than usual with her serve-receive, had a great night hitting. Wenaas feasted as a left-side hitter in Sets 1 & 2, and continued to be effective as Opposite in Sets 3 & 4. I had her with a total of 11 kills (including a dink from the back-row, plus 2 blocks and 2 aces (and zero service errors).

Ohio State was upset at Maryland tonight, giving the Gophers an opportunity to advance in the Big Ten standings – but we failed to take advantage. We play Rutgers at Rutgers on Sunday at noon. I don’t think we can lose this one. Plus I assume Wooker will start.

LIGHT SHED ON MCCUTCHEON’S FUTURE?

A mid-week article in the Strib addressed the topic of what Coach McCutcheon’s job will be as “Assistant Athletic Director / Sport Development Coach.” But it seemed, to me, more “lite” than “light.” McCutcheon has written a recently released book, “Championship Behaviors” (if any reader has read it, please share) apparently explaining his philosophy that “providing a holistic and world-class experience for our (Gopher) student-athletes” is … perhaps more important than winning. And, apparently, McCutcheon’s new role is to teach this philosophy to other Gopher coaches.

As a former Gopher (club) student-athlete and coach, I have no argument with promoting a “holistic and world-class experience” — but I will say that the details 9

in the Strib article) seemed “lite.” I am not suggesting that McCutcheon is a light-weight; by all accounts, McCutcheon is 100% authentic. More likely, whatever it is that McCutcheon is talking about is over the head of Strib Sportswriters.

(The same phenomena plagues Strib coverage of Viking G.M. Kwesi Adofo-Mensah. Adofo-Mensah, a Princeton grad, uses big words, which sportswriters typically don’t understand, so they just write that Adofo-Mensah “is really smart.”)

My guess is that what McCutcheon means is that Gopher Coaches ought to focus on recruiting athletes of “high character,” and on helping them to further develop their athleticism and character during their time at the “U.” And if you do that, you’re going to win most of the time.

And McCutcheon’s record over these past 11 years proves that it works — at least for him. McCutcheon took over a strong program – and made it even stronger – a perennial candidate for the championship of the strongest conference in the country, and multiple Final Four Appearances. His players seem to love him. And his success, including two #1 in the country athletes in the past 3 years, suggests that his emphasis on a “holistic experience” works for recruiting as well. I’m not knocking McCutcheon’s approach.

But how different is this than what every coach in the country, in every sport, all say? Sure, McCutcheon is authentic, but is Lindsey Whelan not? P.J Fleck’s personality turns me off, but even Fleck is probably authentic. We know that geniuses don’t always make good teachers; can McCutcheon teach Whelan and Fleck and the others the “secret sauce” that will turn their brand of authenticity into success? We’ll see.

I haven’t seen much of Penn St. lately, but I got to watch them live at the Big10/Pac10 Challenge games at the Pav in early Sept (their line-up may have evolved since then) when they beat Oregon and Stanford.

The first thing that jumped out at me was the stature of their Outside Hitters. Williams, #23, is listed at 6-0, Starck, #10 & Weatherington, #17 are listed at 6-2 – but none of the three looked that tall. But they are powerful hitters, especially Williams!

Their Jordanian setter, Elisaia listed at 5-10, also doesn’t look that tall – yet she loves to attack. But she can’t block! I thought her hands weren’t good – she was whistled a couple times but could have been whistled more. Their D.S, Grimes, #3, was amazing.

READERS WRITE

R. A. writes: “Big10 primed OSU to win, bringing all three main compeitors (NE, MN, WI) to Columbus as victims to close the season.  They already beat NE 3-1.  There’s no justification to stack MN and WI on the road the last four matches (not even giving us both powderpuff  Rutgers as cover).  NEB is Big10’s 2nd choice, with WI and MN in Lincoln to close the season.

I agree INDIANA was “brilliant” to power-serve us, the only chance they had to survive.  Nearly won 1st set, woulda been big problem for us had they continued.  Unlike Wenaas’s, their power serves were very effective, though we adjusted by the second set (e.g.,: CC coached Landfair to move up when #12 came to the service line).”

JOHN: I guess it’s possible that the BIG 10 has a pro-OSU / anti MINN bias, but the more obvious explanation is that BTN wanted the top 4 teams in back-to-back double-headers to close out their coverage. (ESPN having exclusive rights to the NCAAs.) And it’s an opportunity for the Big10 to showcase their best teams going into the tournament seeding.

And speaking of CC, Reader D.U., noting the loss of the Libero we had recruited to replace McGraw, asked me if, during all the matches I watched at Xcel last week, if I had noticed any top-notch Liberos

JOHN: Short answer, No. Doesn’t mean there weren’t some good ones; when I’m watching a team for the first time, it’s the hitters that catch my attention. And keep in mind that a top D-1 Libero candidate might not be playing Libero for a single-A or double-A high school team. But yes, on-court leadership is one more way we are going to miss McGraw next year – we’d better find a good one..

Our Gophers won in 3 sets, 25-22, 25-9, 25 15, outhitting the Hoosiers .296 to .031.

So what was weird?

• Taylor Landfair was held to 8 kills, breaking her 23-match streak of double-digit kills. (BTW, nothing was wrong with Landfair.)
• The Gophers muffed about 25 serve receives. Their official stat for “serve-receive errors” was only 5 – but that doesn’t include about 20 receives that were either overpasses or saved from out-of-bounds. This failure was shared by Landfair, Kilkelly, Wenaas and even McGraw.
• And yet we still won by a large point-differential.

The Hoosiers committed 9 service errors (at one point 3 in a row) vs 5 aces. I know this would have driven some readers of this blog nuts if they had been Hoosier fans. But here’s the thing: Indiana came into the match knowing that they could not match the power of Landfair, Wenaas and Booth at the net. So they committed, at least in Set 1, to neutralize the Gopher hitters with uber-aggressive serving. In Set 1, 4 of their 6 servers were jump-serving – as hard as they possibly could.

And it almost worked! Midway through Set 1, the Gophers were leading 14-6, and then the Hoosier servers got hot, terrorizing the Gopher receivers  In a blink of an eye, it was 17-17, entirely on the strength of the Hoosier serving. Then they missed long, then short, then long again, allowing the Gophers to escape Set 1 with the 25-22 win.

Landfair had zero kills in Set 1. Personally, I thought Indiana’s “Live by the Sword, Die by the Sword” strategy was brilliant, given their talent deficit; and if I had been coaching the Hoosiers, I would have stayed with it.

But I wasn’t; and they didn’t. Two of their 4 jump-servers stopped jump-serving, and I felt the other 2 toned down a bit. The result was a 25-9 Set 2 win for the Gophs. By Set 3, the Gophers were comfortably back in rhythm, and Landfair, Wenaas, Booth and even Crowl were too much for Indiana.

Booth dominated all match, with 9 kills on 12 sets, and 4 blocks. Crowl, who played because Wooker remains on the bench in sweats, got better as the match went on, ending up with 4 kills and a block.

UP NEXT: Penn St. at Penn St. Friday, 7:30, BTN, and Rutgers at Rutgers on Sunday at Noon, BTN+. Two weeks ago, I said that the Gophs would need to win 6 of their last 8 matches to guarantee a good seed for the NCAA Tournament. And we won the first 4, so now it’s only 2 of the last 4.

But the schedule gets tougher. We shouldn’t have any trouble with Rutgers, but Penn St is the 5^th place team, and always tough at home. Then we finish the regular season on Thanksgiving Weekend playing Ohio St at Ohio St, and Nebraska at Nebraska. (Wisconsin also plays Ohio St at Ohio St, and Nebraska at Nebraska that weekend.) The seeding committee looks for “signature wins,” home and away. The Gophers have signature wins at home over Wisconsin, Florida and Oregon, and a neutral-site win over Baylor; but we have no signature wins on an opponent’s court. And we need one!

SENIOR DAY

A long-standing Gopher tradition following the final regular season game at the Pav, is to recognize the parents of the seniors. (Post-covid, this includes those who have played for 4 years – even though they have a bonus-year of eligibility if they choose to use it.) This afternoon, parents recognized included those of:

• CC McGraw (she’s done)
• Rachel Kilkelly (bonus year available?)
• Ellie Husemann (a likely transfer candidate)
• Naya Gros (she’s done) and
• Miranda Wucherer (McKenna’s sister, she’s done)

Not surprisingly, they also brought out Coach McCutcheon’s family and said a few words about him. I halfway thought they would make a bigger deal of it than they did.

4 NEW STATE CHAMPIONS CROWNED

Well, new for some of the players I guess – but not for 3 of the 4 schools. Both Wayzata, in 4A, and Marshall, in 3A, cruised through a 9-set-sweep of their brackets to win yet another State Tournament. Cannon Falls, not an established dynasty, also won all 9 sets in the 2A Tournament. But Minneota, a Single-A dynasty, had to scrap through the Tourney, dropping a set to New Life Academy in the quarterfinals, and needing OT to overcome long-time rival Mayer Lutheran, 25-23, 25-23, 20-25, 19-25, 18-16.

I wish I had seen that  Minneota – Mayer Lutheran match, but 44 H.S. matches on top of 2 Gopher matches at the Pav is a lot of of V-ball in one weekend, even for me. I did make back to the Xcel last night for the 3A & 4A 3^rd place and Championship Matches.

Marshall is a machine. They lost 2 matches during the season; both to 4A Runner-up Lakeville North. I said 2 nights ago that I wasn’t that impressed with the Swenson Twins in the quarters, but I was very impressed with Setter-Stella last night; Gopher fans are going to love Stella. Sister & Outside Hitter Olivia also played well last night; Olivia doesn’t look quite D1 ready, but she’s only a H.S. Junior. She’s big and strong and she’ll get smoother. Freshman Setter Eva didn’t get to play with Stella on the floor.

And there were additional seniors who stood out to me (in no particular order) last night, who I hadn’t noticed on Wednesday or Friday (there are two matches going on simultaneously): Marshall senior Middle Hitter Anna Bider, Marshall senior Setter Laura Wheary, East Ridge senior Outside Hitter Makayla McDougle, Rogers senior Middle Hitter Hannah Bruiskiewicz (don’t hold me to spelling on any of these names), and Wayzata senior Opposite Katy Vogt.

Plus two names to remember: Wayzata sophomore Middle Hitter Katy Kalzenberg and Lakeville North freshman Middle Hitter Rayna Christianson. I excuse myself for not intially noticing Kalzenberg among the talent-loaded Trojans, but I should have noticed Christianson on Wednesday. She really stood out last night, giving Wayzata trouble. And this 6-1 freshman could still grow.

It took our Gophs about an hour to sweep 3 sets from Maryland, 25-12, 25-13, 25-16. The Terrapins aren’t a bad team; they came into the Pav with a 5 & 9 Conference record. But they didn’t serve aggressively enough to keep the Gophs out of system. Either they don’t have that capability or they hadn’t read a scouting report. It is pretty well known around the league that if you allow the Gophers to play in-system, Booth and our Left-side Hitters are going to be trouble, and for the match, the Gophs hit .287 vs .043 for the Terrapins.

Wooker was not-dressed again tonight, we haven’t heard what her injury is (if you know, please share), but she sat out yet another match. This moves Wenaas to Left-side (and puts Crowl in the lineup at Opposite); and wow did Wenaas have fun in Set 1 – with 7 kills. Wenaas looked so good in Set 1 that I started wondering how Coach McCutcheon could possibly move her back to Opposite when Wooker gets healthy? But then Wenaas had zero kills in Set 2. When I was coaching 16U, my assumption would be that my red-hot hitter had said something about my setter’s boyfriend between sets, but presumably the Gophers are more mature. Whatever happened to slow Wenaas down, she got 2 more kills in Set 3 to finish with 9, plus 12 digs.

Landfair had 11 kills, and Booth had 9 kills (mostly slides, tonight) and 3 blocks, and Shaffmaster had 4 kills to go with her 30 assists. And Kilkelly had a good night serving, with 4 aces, no service errors, and served at least 15 points. (She had Landfair and Booth in the front row when she was serving.)

Crowl, who played the entire 3-set match, had 1 kill – not very productive. Davis added 5 kills and 2 blocks. I guess it’s time for me to admit that Davis is our other (with Booth) starting Middle. I liked Gros, but she’s riding the bench while Davis plays.

NEXT UP: Indiana on Sunday. The Hoosiers have a similar record to Maryland, but I think they serve very aggressively.

SIGNINGS:  2 OUT OF 3 AIN’T BAD

With the announced retirement of Coach McCutcheon, I feared the worst for Gopher recruiting. Yet, somehow, the Gophers managed to sign two of the top 2023 recruits in the country. Signing with the Gophs on Wednesday were:

• Sydney Schnichels from Willmar, considered the top recuit in Minnesota. Schnichels is a 6-4 Outside Hitter; and
• Calissa Minatee from Kansas City, the #20-ranked recruit in the country. Minatee is a 6-1 Middle Hitter.

Both are scheduled to be among the Top 24 H.S. Seniors competing in the Under Armour All American Game in December.

The Gophers lost out on Libero Laney Choboy, who switched her verbal commitment from the Gophs to Nebraska after learning of McCutcheon’s retirement. Schnichels and Minatee were both aware of the coaching change, but signed with the Gophers anyway.

I assume Choboy is very good, and we certainly need a new Libero with McGraw’s eligibility expiring. But I thought McCutcheon’s departure would hurt this year’s crop of recruits worse than 2 out of 3. If the Gophers can retain their core group of stars, Landfair, Wenaas, Shaffmaster, Wooker, Booth, etc, I think Maroon & Gold will be attractive colors for Transfer-Portal Liberos.

HIGH SCHOOL TOURNEY

I, and Reader R.S. (others, maybe?), have caught parts of the H.S. Tourney – great V-Ball as always. So far, I have seen the 4A Quarters:

• The 4-5 matchup is often the most exciting quarterfinal in any division, and Rogers/Chaska did not disappoint. Rogers looked terrible losing Set 1, 14-25, and falling behind 1-7 in Set 2, Then, magically, they came roaring back to win in 4, 25-19, 26-24, 26-24. Wonderful match!
• I did not expect #1 Seed Wayzata to have any trouble with unseeded Burnsville, but Burnsville was scrappy. Wayzata won in three, 25-20, 25-20, 25-18, but as the scores suggest, it wasn’t easy.
• Wayzata’s Gopher-bound (class of ’24) Swenson Twins, Setter Stella and Outside Hitter Olivia, didn’t seem to dominate as much as I expected. This might be a trick of my expectations – last year, not even knowing who she was, Stella blew me away. This year, I expected more.

And the 3A Semis:

• 3A is a step down in terms of player heights and team depth, but at this level, they still play very good V-Ball;
• Top seed Marshall and high seed Benilde St. Margeret’s both won in straight sets (over Grand Rapids & Kasson-Mantorville) and will meet for the Championship at 6:30 on Saturday. Both won on the strength of taller (or at least stronger) front lines than their semifinal opponents. There was one particularly interesting single-rally where Grand Rapids had 6 consecutive bump-set-spike combinations – without the ball ever penetrating (more than an inch) into the Marshall court — due to Marshall’s “wall” of blockers.

And miscellaneous

• Other HS Tourney players who stood out to me (in no particular order) included Burnsville sophomore Outside Hitter Mesalya Bennet, Rogers sophomore Setter Anya Schmidt, Stillwater junior Middle Hitter McKenzie Peters, Marshall senior Outside Hitter Leah Jones, Marshall senior Middle Hitter Randi Werdorff, BSM senior Outside Hitter Lily Eigner, BSM senior Middle Hitter Sierra Limpkin and Kasson-Mantorville junior Outside Hitter Ellie Ask. Based on my limited sample, I don’t know that any of these girls are Gopher material, but they are all talented players with a post-high-school future in V-Ball is they choose to pursue it.
• Another thing I noticed was a shift, certainly over-the-years, if not dramatically this year, in the officiating. Not too many years ago, the State H.S. Volleyball Tournament showcased referees blowing their whistles on the slightest opportunity. But on Wednesday, the refs were letting the girls play. I applaud this; it makes sense to call 14U matches tight, because those girls are learning how to play. But everyone in the State H.S. Volleyball Tournament handles the ball well enough that picky reffing is unnecessary.

Our Gophers pulled out a 5-set nail-biter at Illinois, 25-15, 16-25, 25-19, 23-25, 15-13. And to make it even harder on an old guy, they did it at almost the exact same time as my second favorite team, the Vikings, pulled out their own nail-biter. My Gopher V-Ballers don’t generally play at the same time as the Vikings, and I don’t remember them ever finishing a close one at the same time. The llini tied the volleyball match at 2 sets apiece at almost the exact same time that the Vikes tied the Commanders at 17-all, late in the 4^th quarter.

Illinois is an aggressive serving team, one capable of exploiting the Gophers weakness at serve-receive; and also an aggressive hitting team, who tallied 68 total kills vs 54 by the Gophs. So it was a tough, hard-fought win for a Gopher squad still not at full-strength. Wooker was still in sweats, pulling Wenaas to Left-side and Crowl in the line-up at Opposite. Crowl did not impress, and Julie Hanson replaced her to start Set 3, but Hanson didn’t impress either and Crowl came back to finish the match. And for the 2^nd match in a row, McCutcheon played Arica Davis as the “other” Middle opposite Booth (7 kills, 6 blocks, and a dominate presence throughout), while Gros and Husemann, both apparently healthy, remained on the bench. Davis delivered another decent performance, with 6 kills and 5 blocks, so I don’t know if Gros is slightly injured, or in the doghouse, or if Davis has played her way into the line-up.

Landfair, as usual, led the Gophers with 19 kills, including at least 4 from the back-row. But she remains (frustrating to me) reluctant to attack a poor set. And without Wooker in the line-up, it feels, especially in a close, back & forth match, that the Gophers can get over-dependent on Landfair.

Fortunately, Wenaas, more comfortable I think hitting Left-side, picked up the slack, with 14 kills, including 5 back-row kills. (I can’t recall Wenaas ever getting more than 1 back-row kill in a match.) Wenaas got 2 of her back-row kills early in Set 1, leading the Gophs to an easy win over the apparently over-matched Illini. The Gophs hit .417 in Set 1, and I was thinking straight sets.

But the Illini completely flipped the switch in Set 2, serving at Landfair and blocking ferociously to shut down the Gopher offense. Down 5-10, the Gophs got back to within 1 at 10-11, but Illinois cruised to an easy win.

Illinois stayed hot to start Set 3, winning the first 3 points. But the Gopher offense came back to life with a 17-9 run for a 17-12 lead, and coasted to the win, again hitting around .400.

Set 4 involved trading runs. The Gophs led 6-2; the Illini tied it at 8. The Gophs led 15-11; the Illini tied it at 15. The Gophs led 20-16; the Illini tied it at 20. Tied at 23-23, I felt relatively confident that the Gophers would get the next 2 points; but it was Illinois that got the next 2 points.

There were no runs in Set 5. It was tied 2-2, 5-5, 7-7, 9-9 & 11-11 — before the Gophers finally took over; Wenaas getting the kill at match-point.

With the win, the Gophers advance to 10 & 4 in the Big Ten, retaining solo possession of 4^th place; and 15-7 overall. The Gophers spent the week ranked #9 in the country, and with wins over Michigan and Illinois, we should rank no lower than #9 when the new rankings come out tomorrow. I said that the Gophers needed to win 6 of their last 8 to lock-in a top 16 seed; they won the first two, so now it’s only 4 of 6.

NEXT UP: Maryland (Fri, 6:30, BTN+) and Indiana (Sun, 2:00, BTN+)  at the Pav. I haven’t seen much of either team, but their records suggest that both are almost as good as Illinois. The Gophers need to win both matches. It would be nice to have Wooker back.