Thursday, Sept 2 Match Day!

Updates: For those checking in today…a gift. Here is the updated NPI rankings:

There will be lots of movement for a few weeks.

Watching Southwestern/TLU. SU up early. The are running a 5-1. They used that lineup mostly last week but also used a 6-2. I will, once again, encourage my Pirates to serve in.

Despite the serving issues, SU up 16-7 and TLU has just used their last timeout. SU hitting 0.611. TLU hitting zero. Oh, Richelle Guerra gets hit in the head but stays in the match.

Congrats to Carly Caraway (SU) on her first dig. Hope there are many more. Set one ends 25-15. TLU just never got going. They are really young. Briana Salvatierra-Moore (TLU) hitting 0.750 but not much else going outside her and Ryann Ely. Annika Flora (SU) with 14 assists and a kill (although she had two so not sure who got credited for the other one).

Southwestern with the sweep. Not really tested by TLU. They had a tough first weekend and it will be interesting to see if this match helps them do well this weekend. Kendall Jurgens with 12 kills hitting 0.500. Flora with 33 assists. The two first-year outsides (Blanchard and Ahrens) combined for 18 kills and just 2 errors. Richelle Guerra for TLU finished with 21 assists but the team hit only 0.101.

Some undefeated teams that stayed undefeated nationally are Elms (2-0), Eastern (4-0) and Franklin & Marshall (4-0). Still a number of matches being played.

Oxy with an easy sweep. 32 team kills to just 6. Jasmine Shum with 10 kills hitting 0.667.

National Games to Watch:

NCAA Scoreboard

Some good matches but nothing that I would stop down for tonight.

West Schedule:

TLU 0 Southwestern 3 West Coast Baptist 0 Occidental 3

Random Thoughts:

Prior to the season, I wanted to head to the Oshkosh tournament this weekend but having missed out on the Puget Sound Tournament (co-hosted by PLU), I really want to see my Pirates in person and make fun of Puget Sound Head Coach Mark Massey in person. With that said, I will not be at Southwestern match tonight. They play one match today, tomorrow and Saturday so we’ll come down tomorrow and try to catch those matches and then the one’s on Saturday. That means I’m expecting 2XL schools shirts from Puget Sound, TLU and IWU. We’ll see who comes through.

As for this match, TLU always plays Southwestern tough. Or is it the other way around? Always good matches. I think both squads are still trying to figure out what they have and their best lineups. My hope is that SU has it figured out and TLU takes just one extra match to do the same.

In the other match, Oxy plays a non-DIII team. They should win this one. I was pretty impressed with them against UCSC on Sunday. They have some nice pieces on the squad. One more recruiting year will make a big difference, too.

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