We got our first look at the 2025 Gophers this afternoon, in an exhibition match vs Northern Iowa. Technically, the Gophs first match was this morning vs the Iowa Hawkeyes, but that match was not open to the public; must be some limit on the number of public, Spring, exhibitions?
In case you’re wondering, the Gophs won Sets 1, 2 & 4 of this four-sets-regardless exhibition. We lost Set 3, playing our second=string against what I think was N.I.’s starters. I focussed my attention on two things: New Players, and Who will win the “starting” role for contested positions.
NEW PLAYERS:
- Freshman Libero McKenna Garr, from Rush City, MN, was not given the opportunity to play Libero, but she got several shifts as a D.S., and was impressive.
- Freshman Opposite Carly Gilk, from Champlin Park, played in Sets 3 & 4 and looked great, earning 8 kills.
- Junior Transfer Setter (from Rutgers) Georgia Lee played some. Her role will be to step in when Stella is injured. We would not, in any case, want Stella to get injured, and this concern grew after watching Lee. At least today, she did not look as strong as the graduated Elise McGhie.
- Grad Transfer Middle (from Purdue) Lourdes Myers was a pleasant surprise, playing Sets 1 & 2 and looking good enough to compete for a starting role.
- Freshman Middle Jordan Taylor, from Texas, playing Sets 2 & 3, also looked good enough to compete for a starting role.
- Red-shirt Freshman Leftside Olivia Swenson (Stella’s sister) played sparingly, and has yet to convince me that she is a D-1 athlete. AND
- Red-shirt Freshman Setter Stella Swenson looked great, as expected, and well worth the expense of two “full rides.”
- Much anticipated Freshman Leftside Kelly Kinney, the Gophers’ highest-rated player in this recruiting class is, sadly, still in Florida finishing high school. It wasn’t long ago that high school seniors were expected to spend the Spring of their freshman years attending high school. But it has become common for volleyball recruits (and presumably other “fall athletes,” like football and soccer players) to graduate early and enroll in their future college for the Spring Semester. There may be a perfectly good explanation why Kinney didn’t – but it makes me nervous.
COMPETITION FOR STARTING ROLES:
- There is no competition at Setter. It’s Stella or pray for an electrical outage that cancels the match.
- I expected a 3-way competition at the Opposite position, featuring Crowl and Schnickels, who played behind Grote the past two seasons, and the freshman Gilk. But 2022 Ms. Minnesota Volleyball Schnickels played little and, at least today, did not appear to be a serious contender. Not sure why; she didn’t seem injured.
Crowl and Gilk are both left-handed, a clear advantage for an Opposite. Crowl, a 6-4, 5th year Senior is taller, more experienced, and, at least today, the better blocker; I think she had 5 blocks today, in roughly 2 sets. And she a great save of someone else’s poor first pass. Plus, she’s a decent server.
Gilk, a 6-2 Freshman, had minimal success blocking, and minimal success serving – but she had 8 kills! in less than 2 full sets at Opposite. If today is any indication, it appears that Crowl is superior defensively, but Gilk will produce more offense – maybe a lot more.
- I also expected a 3-way competition for the two MIddle positions (4-way if you count Engeman, but I don’t) .
> The 6-1 Junior Minatee played Sets 1 and 4, and looked good. Minatee was a starter last year, and as the only “returner” of the 3, would seem to have an edge in this competition. But she’s undersized.
> The 6-3 Grad Transfer Myers played Sets 1 and 2 and looked like a competent, experienced D-1 Middle.
> The 6-3 FreshmanTaylor played Sets 2 and 3 and looked great.
Even with Engeman playing Sets 3 and 4, the Gopher Middles dominated N.I. I predict that Minatee and Myers will be the starters in the first match of the fall season, but Taylor could push both and could become a starter by season’s end.
- I also expect a 3-way competition for the Libero and D.S. positions.
> The Junior Palabiyik (I’m considering the nickname “Tilapia” which is easier to say) is the incumbent Libero, played the position most of today, and will likely be the starter to open the fall season.
> The Junior Thibault, the incumbent D.S., played Libero in today’s Set 2, D.S. in other sets, served well throughout, and will likely be the starting D.S. to open the fall season.
> But the Freshman Garr looked very good. I expect Palabiyik to retain her starting Libero role, but I wouldn’t be surprised if Garr pushes ahead of Thibault before season’s end.
Interestingly, there were times today when the Gophers employed a 3-Libero serve-receive, as Nebraska did on their path to last year’s National Runner-Up finish. If we can get away with this (Liberos sub in and out freely, but there is a 12 substitutions per set limit on other players), Stella ought to get better passes than Shaffmaster got back in 2023 – from that horrible receive including Landfair and Wooker.
- As of today, Leftside Hitter is the most up-in-the-air of any position, with 4 potential candidates (5 if you count Olivia, but I don’t) for 2 positions. 2024 leading Hitter and First-Team-All-Big-Ten senior Hanson is the obvious front-runner. Barring injury, I can’t imagine Hanson won’t be one of the two. She was decent today. But after that, the outlook gets murky.
> The senior Wooker has shown the ability to be a dominant Big-Ten Leftside Hitter – when she’s 100% healthy. But she had a serious back-problem most of last season, missing some matches and struggling in some of the matches she played in. And during today’s exhibition, Wooker was on the bench in sweats and limping. The U is tight-lipped about the health of their student-athletes (does any reader know anything?); my guess is that she may have had off-season surgery – and they’re keeping her out of action until August?
> The Sophomore Acevedo played a fair amount last year, in place of Wooker, great now and then, poorly now and then; mostly okay. She was also decent today, playing most of the match, but I suspect she is option # 4.
> Kinney is still in Florida finishing High School.
NEXT UP: Saturday, April 5, in Brookings, S. D., two matches vs:
10 a.m, vs South Dakota State and
1:30 p.m., vs. Creighton (an Elite Eight finish last year)
I’ll be there covering the matches for GopherVBallRocks. (Gonna be a long drive home, not sure when I’ll get the blog-post done.)