Last evening, our Gopher volleyball team hosted a squad of professional volleyball players, all former collegiate stars, representing Athletes Unlimited; this same squad scheduled to play the Badgers in Madison this evening. For a $7 admission, I was expecting to see talented athletes playing high level volleyball – and that’s what I, and roughly 3,000 other area volleyball fans, saw. No complaints, there. I was also expecting to see our undermanned Gopher get beat – and hardly any shame to that. But I didn’t. Nor was I particularly entertained.
“Spring Volleyball” matches, at least the women’s collegiate version, to my knowledge an entirely post-pandemic phenomena, are “exhibitions.” The NDSU match ten days ago, and the three I saw last spring, in a variety of venues, had all the characteristics of exhibition matches:
- Two college teams;
- Both trying to win, if substituting freely;
- In front of a free-admission audience;
- Keeping score – but without recorded stats; and
- The winner obvious, if unofficial.
But what we saw last night was more of a “scrimmage,” a chance to see some of our favorite athletes in action – but not a competitive or contested “match.” Perhaps a competitive, contested match was impossible, given that our Gophers only had one Middle, Arica Davis, available. Calissa Minatee, who played reasonably well against the height-challenged Bison last week, was present, and in uniform, but never stepped on the court despite the very-free lineup juggling. She was either injured or “in the dog-house” for some reason. I was looking forward to seeing how our height-challenged pair of Middles would fare against full-sized professionals. Instead:
- Set 1 (Gophs, 25-23) was contested with Davis and 6-3 Illinois-Grad Ali Bastianelli playing Middle for the Gophs, and former Gopher favorite Taylor (Morgan) Reid playing Middle for A.U.
- In Set 2 (A.U. 25-27), Taylor played for the Gophs and Bastianelli for the Gophs, Also in Set 2, the Gophs played a 6-2, with Eilse McGhei and Julia Hanson sharing time with starters Melani Shaffmaster and Lauren Crowl. Notable in the Set 2 loss, was the Gophers total ineptitude at covering A,U. dinks to our middle-of-the-court “doughnut.”
- In Set 3 (technically won by the Gophers, but which Gophers?), A.U. provided both “Gopher” Middles, while McGhei, Wooker and Crowl played for A.U.
- And more mix-&-match in Set 4.
Though a very different experience than I had expected, it was, never-the-less, possible to observe the performance of individual Gophers:
- Left-side hitters Taylor Landfair and “The Wooker” were not outplayed by the professionals. If anything, they seemed to out-perform the A.U. Left-side hitters. As I’ve previously said, the ’23 Gophers should have the best pair of Left-side hitters in collegiate volleyball.
- I had Wooker with 2 service- aces against 5 errors; not exactly the ace/error ratio we want, but she served very aggressively throughout the match, which was nice to see. And
- One of the A.U. receivers Wooker was serving to was former Stanford Star Libero Morgan Hentz – who DOMINATED! Best one-match performance by a Libero I’ve ever seen. If Buckeye-transfer Kylie Murr, not yet arrived (finishing her degree, maybe?), is anywhere near as good, this team with Murr is going to be much better than the team we fielded last night.
- Meanwhile, our Gophs were making do with Skylar Gray at Libero. Gray is presumably the heir-apparent at D.S., but unless this 3rd-yr player from Maple Grove improves dramatically between now and September, we need other options. (McGei, maybe? An incoming walk-on freshman?)
- One of our “starting-lineup” serve-receive rotations featured Crowl hitting left-side, Wooker hitting right-side (i.e., both out of position), and a 3-person receive of Landfair, Wooker and Gray. Remember last season, when our receiving was often problematic? Landfair was our weakest receiver, who opponents picked on, and Wooker and Gray weren’t considered good enough to help.
- Frankly, I expected Melani Shaffmaster to be out-played by former Badger Star Sidney Hilley, but the difference in their setting wasn’t obvious. (Hilley definitely saved more errant passes.)
- Crowl continued to look good. She’s no Sammedy, and not the 6-rotation player Wenaas was. But Crowl might prove as effective a Right-side hitter as Wenaas was.
- Davis looked good (as good as a 5-11 Middle is likely to look) and Julia Hanson played much better than she had vs NDSU.
NEXT UP: Kansas St, 1:00 p.m. Saturday, April 22, at Simpson College (1/2 hr south of Des Moines)
ALSO: Congratulations to the Gopher Men’s and Women’s Hockey Teams making the Final Four; let’s hope the Men have better luck.