With the starting lineup back on the court (no Crowl, Acevedo only serving), the Gophers swept the Hoosiers, 25-18, 25-19, 25-19. I couldn’t tell during warmups if Wooker was going to play or not, but she started the match. She looked a bit tentative at first, or maybe just rusty, and with the Gophs up narrowly, at 19-16, she did not yet have a kill, But then she had 3 convincing kills in a row, putting us up 22-16.
Grote led the Gophs with 13 kills and a 565%, but well-balanced past that; Minatee & Hanson with 8 apiece (2 of Hanson’s from the back row), Wooker had 7 and Awoleye 6 – plus 7 blocks (the official Gophers stats gave Awoleye 10 blocks, but they count funny). But it’s Wooker’s return to the lineup that allows Grote to play Opposite, where she is comfortable, versus filling in for Wooker at Leftside.
And our “receive,” of Palabiyik, Wooker and either Thibault or Hanson was sooo much better than the past two weekends. I felt that the Hoosiers served aggressively all night, but we had minimal difficulty. Wooker had the only 2 errors, and that’s not bad as they were serving at her all night, And being “in system” on roughly 70% (I’m guessing) of our sideout attempts gave our Middles a chance to hit, which they did. Thibault looked better than last week also.
Speaking of Middle Hitting, last season and early this season, Minatee could only score on “slides,” and Awoleye only on “quicks.” (plus the random overpass) limiting the element of surprise in our attack. But tonight, Minatee had 3 quicks to go with her 5 slides, and 3 of Awoleye’s kills were slides. If we can keep this up against strong teams, we will have a much better chance of victory.
I also want to repeat something I wrote a couple weeks ago about Palabiyik’s improvement. Last year, we played the first half of the season without a D.S. (and it hurt us) because Coach Cook didn’t seem to trust Palabiyik. And pre-season, I was skeptical if she could handle the Libero position. But set after set, she “saves” multiple points with spectacular digs; I have become a big Palabiyik fan.
Indiana does not appear to be among the top teams in the Big Ten, and we should have swept them, as we did. Maryland, tomorrow’s night’s opponent (5:00, BTN) doesn’t look much better, but they did win a set at #3 Penn State.