Weekend Wrap-Up

Wow! Where to start? First off, it’s really hard to update the site while sitting in a gym. Sorry for the late updates.

First some book keeping items. I’ve added a standings section on the left side of this site that I’ll see if I can keep updated. It’s a one stop shop for all of the teams in the West Region. Now that we have some games under our belt, I’ll start trying to get the Watch List going. Please remember that I’m all about tracking the at-large bids and that began on Friday. I guarantee you that teams have lost out on an at-large bid with a loss on the first day of the season. It’s not fair but it’s true. As a reminder, our normal week includes putting out an updated ranking on Mondays. The AVCA poll comes out Tuesdays. Player of the weeks from each conference get combined on Wednesday. Thursday I try to come out with an article. Sunday is when the wrap-up comes out. Any day there is a match in the West Region, there will be a Match Day with the schedule and my thoughts.

I started writing this wrap-up and it sounded like a trip report. I don’t think you want to read that. I’ll add some notes to the bottom of this post about the Pacific Coast Tournament but for now I’ll follow my normal format from last year.

Starting with the ASC East Division and we have 3 undefeated teams. Belhaven had their own tournament where they went 4-0 but played the same two schools twice and neither is in DIII (USCAA and NAIA). UT-Dallas also had their own tournament but only played two matches, sweeping both UW-Superior and Heidelberg. Their schedule gets tougher next week as they play in the Trinity Tournament. I was able to watch a little of the Superior match and it was good to see Brinkman back on the floor and doing well. Jillian Via was the star finishing with 27 points over the 2 matches. UT-Tyler is in a unique spot as they reclassify to DII next year. They are still in DIII and their matches count but they can’t play in any DIII conference or NCAA tournaments. The Patriots went out to Emory and went 4-0 taking down #13 Illinois Wesleyan as well as a couple of other teams that are traditionally very good. They also won a 5-setter, which only helps their confidence down the road. ETBU went 1-3 on the weekend after going to Colorado College for their Tournament. Their win was against North Central but they dropped a tough 5-setter to Nebraska Wesleyan and were swept by both St. Thomas and Colorado College. Bigger than the losses, however, was the loss of freshman middle Carley Boswell who broke a bone in her leg during play. Please send a healing thought out to Carley. Both LeTourneau and Louisiana College started the year at 0-2 with LC having to cancel their first two matches due to “unfortunate circumstances”.

Over to the ASC West Division and we have 3 undefeated teams and two that have yet to start playing (Howard Payne and Sul Ross State). Hardin-Simmons played at the Austin College Tournament but didn’t draw a tough crowd as they went 4-0 dropping only 2 games. They head out to Cal Lutheran next weekend with the Regals match being their toughest draw there. UMHB went 2-0 over at the UTD Tournament with sweeps over both Heidelberg and UW-Superior. Corinne Novak led the team in kills but it was the play of new transfers Gillean and Martin that was noteworthy. UMHB is playing a 6-2 this year with Martin and preseason All-Region pick Miranda Klein and stuck to an 8 player rotation. They appear already in mid-season form. They head to Cal Lutheran this weekend and draw some really interesting opponents. Watch out for the Cru. McMurry did what they had to do by going 4-0 this weekend over at the Virginia Wesleyan Tournament. The started with a close 5-set match win against the hosts (18-16 in the 5^th set with Jasmine Jones finishing with 19 kills) and ended their weekend with an important 4-set win over Randolph-Macon. Concordia went 2-2 in what I would have to say is a bit of a disappointment. They dropped matches against both Austin College and Dallas with the Dallas match being the surprise.

Overall with the ASC I would have to say that I’m a little surprised how well UTT started and how seamless UMHB has integrated in their transfers. I’m really happy with McMurry’s start but with their weaker schedule, they are really forced to take matches against UTD and UMHB this season to have a chance at an NCAA at-large bid (if they don’t win the conference).

With the NWC, I see a lot of early wins as the only sub-500 team is Puget Sound. George Fox leads us off as they went 4-0 in the Oregon Trail Tournament playing at home. Hard to say how good those wins are because their opponents took home some heavy losses by everyone they played. Lewis & Clark has to be the surprise as they were picked last in the conference but they also went 4-0 and didn’t drop a set. That includes a sweep of UW-Stout who had already beaten fellow NWC teams in Whitman, Pacific and Willamette! This is going to be a really interesting story to see if the Pioneers can keep this up. Kudos to Kortney Meyer for an outstanding weekend. L&C head over to Washington & Lee this weekend and more sweeps will be needed to make others sit up and take notice. Linfield is another 4-0 team as they only dropped 1 set all weekend. Good weekend but their competition was on the light side. Their tournament this week at Austin College will be a better gauge. Pacific Lutheran was expected to go 4-0 (not dropping a set) and their competition was better than the other teams mentioned. Sweeps of Oshkosh and #16 Millikin will keep the Lutes in the national picture. Whitworth is yet another 4-0 team out of the NWC as they also beat up on some of the weaker teams their conference mates played. They head off to Emory this weekend where they will try to make a name for themselves this season. Whitman went 3-1 on the weekend dropping a 5-set match to UW-Stout. Not much to go on here except that they lost to a team that L&C swept. Whitman heads to Cal Lutheran and draws a couple of really good teams so we’ll know more soon. I expected Pacific to be one of the contenders in the NWC but they also dropped a 5-set match against UW-Stout. They head off to Colorado College (with Pac Lu) for a couple of really tough matches but that UW-Stout loss probably hurts Pacific more than any other single loss to another NWC so far this season. Willamette is 3-1 with a loss to UW-Stout and wins over lesser opponents. Matches down at Cal Lutheran will tell us more this weekend. Puget Sound hosted their own tournament with stronger opponents but could only manage a win against Elizabethtown. Losses to Oshkosh, Millikin and Pac Lutheran were probably expected but not what the Loggers wanted. They are another NWC team that heads down to Cal Lutheran this weekend and they need a little redemption.

Overall, not a lot to gleam from this weekend in the Northwest conference. The bulk of the schools played weaker teams, which means this upcoming weekend is vital in order to keep at-large bid hopes alive. Pacific Lutheran seems to have resolved their setter situation and I look forward to their Colorado College match this weekend. As I mentioned, Pacific’s loss to UW-Stout really hurt because their schedule doesn’t allow for any bumps in the road. The biggest surprise (by far) is Lewis & Clark and if you were drawing conclusions from this weekend only you would have to say they are the second best team in the NWC. Who would have thunk that?

Now on to the SCAC and the big three two of Colorado College, Trinity and Southwestern! Yeah, I’ll get to my Pirates in a second, but first let’s discuss the twin Tigers of the SCAC in Colorado College and Trinity. Colorado College once again lured unsuspecting programs into their lair and came away with a 4-0 weekend. Their big win was a 4-set effort against St. Thomas led by one of my favorite fliers in Haley Harris who had 15 kills. This coming weekend they get an NCAA Tournament rematch against the Lutes of Pacific Lutheran, which should be one of the better matches of the year so far. Trinity also went 4-0 dropping 3 sets in total but playing top notch opponents in Cabrini, #7 Gustavus Adolphus, UW-Stevens Point and Aurora. I got to watch one of their matches and the surprising thing to me was that senior libero (and one of my preseason All-Region picks) Sarah Mullens was playing DS with Sophomore Sami Lin at the libero spot. I will say that Lin played perfectly in the time I watched. Looks like setter Lieberman is running a 5-1 and the big hitters from the week were Tuggle and McKay. Southwestern is next. Whoops…Austin College went 3-1 with a loss to Hendrix. Next week they get McMurry, which should be an interesting contest. Southwestern…uh oh. TLU went 1-1 with a win over UW-Superior but a loss to Heidelberg. Not horrible but not what they needed. They travel over to Trinity for their tournament this weekend and draw some heavy hitters where they will need to do well. Southwestern…huh? Dallas went 1-2 on the weekend against teams that should have given them trouble so I really do like their win over Concordia. I had Dallas picked 7^th in conference but maybe they’ve got more than I first thought. Southwestern…no freaking way! Schreiner went 1-3 with a win over Louisiana College. They also took a set off of Millsaps, which is really not a bad weekend for this team as they try to rebuild with a young squad. And now, finally, we have Southwestern! You all should know my love towards Southwestern by now but frankly I wouldn’t be doing this high-paying job correctly if I didn’t call them out when they needed it. My Pirates went 1-3 on the weekend playing top end programs but only coming away with a sweep of Occidental. Losses to La Verne, #14 Carthage and #1 CMS aren’t the end of the world but a number of the sets were not close. I talked a lot about reloading versus rebuilding with respect to Southwestern prior to the year but their senior graduation coupled with the loss of a couple of players that should have returned means a playing rotation that consists of 7 freshmen at times and that is the definition of a rebuild. These freshmen have a lot of talent but it didn’t jive together. To make matters worse, the defense and service receive, which should be a strength, failed them at times. The Tuesday match at Chapman is a big one for the Pirates as they try to right the ship. Centenary dropped their 3 matches over the weekend winning only one set. I expected them to be a little more competitive. Newcomer JWU (Denver) went up to the northwest only to get swept in all four matches. They have a new team and a lot of freshmen so this isn’t surprising.

Overall, both Colorado College and Trinity looked to be Top 10 teams this year. Southwestern needs to figure out how to turn a talented young team into a winner…and fast. The jury is out on the rest of the teams until more matches are played.

There is only one undefeated team in the SCIAC and that’s the Regals from Cal Lutheran. Wins over #6 JWU (RI) and #14 Carthage highlighted a great weekend and put to rest worries of another slow start as was seen last year. Chapman went 3-1 with their loss coming at the hands of Carthage. A sweep of a tough Salisbury team highlighted their weekend. They get Southwestern at home on Tuesday before getting a number of NWC teams this weekend. (More on Chapman below in my notes from this weekend.) CMS also went 3-1 on the weekend as they basically played their 2^nd string. OK, it wasn’t that bad but they were missing at least 3 starters and it got to the point that their setter, Phoebe Madsen, who started the weekend running a 5-1 was forced into a hitting role along the front and finished with a .348 hitting percentage. Junior Amanda Walker carried the bulk of the load finishing with 72.5 points over 4 matches. The loss came at the hands of #6 JWU (RI) but really this weekend the Athena’s could have gone 1-3 as easily as 4-0. Redlands surprised me by going 3-1 on the weekend with their only loss to a really good Brandeis team. The Redlands were picked 8^th in the SCIAC but they look much improved. Caltech went 1-1 playing two non-DIII teams and so not much to go on here. La Verne started strong with a 4-set win over #9 Southwestern but then got swept by Salisbury and lost a 4-set match against JWU (RI) as they finished 2-2. Not sure what we have with the Leopards just yet. Pomona also finished 2-2 with losses to Salisbury and Franklin & Marshall. It’s the F&M loss that has me a little worried but we’ll learn more after this weekend as they play in the Cal Lutheran Tournament. Occidental went 1-3 with a tough loss against Union but did end up sweeping Franklin & Marshall. Whittier really challenged themselves by going to #5 Emory but ended up losing to the hosts as well as #13 IWU and Saint Benedict. This was really a tough group but it still surprised me that the Poets couldn’t end with at least 2 wins. This makes this upcoming weekend a huge event with the UMHB match as close to a must win as you can get week 2.

Overall, there were lots of surprises from the SCAIC. Cal Lu taking down two Top 25 teams on the first day. CMS struggling all weekend trying to overcome their injuries. Redlands playing better than expected. Whittier with only one win at this point of the season. On the one hand, the SCIAC is going to be a bear if Cal Lu is going to continue this kind of play. On the other, we still need to see what we have in Chapman and Whittier and La Verne. We also need to see how long term some of the CMS injuries are going to be.

Mills and UC Santa Cruz both failed to win matches this weekend although the Slugs were able to win a few sets. They get another chance during the Cal Lutheran Tournament. Mills will play a few non-DIII teams.

Notes from my weekend trip out to CMS for those trying to get some sleep:

• The Roberts Pavilion (CMS) is the gold standard that all other facilities should be measured against. Holy cow, it was impressive.

• Most vocal bench of the weekend goes to the Regals of Cal Lutheran. Nice job ladies.

• I really didn’t come away impressed with JWU (RI). I only got to see the Cal Lutheran match but their libero just killed them and they looked discouraged most of the time. Saying that, I heard the libero played great after that so chalk it up to first match jitters.

• Keep an eye out on what CMS does with their setters. They had a number of ball handling errors called but can they afford not to let Phoebe Madsen hit out of the front row?

• I was really impressed with Brandeis libero. Had an amazing match against CMS.

• Speaking of the CMS/Brandeis match, the Athena’s only won because I led the students in a cheer on match point. I told you I’m all about the West Region!

• I see you Chapman. I was so smart to pick you higher in the SCIAC than the coaches. All because of your transfers! Except that your transfers didn’t play and instead you have these stud freshmen (Jessi Lumsden and Sophie Srivastava) just killing it on the court. Hey I’ll take luck any day of the week with my picks.

• With my freshman of the year pick CMS Melanie Williams injured; my mulligan may be Chapman’s RS/S Sophie Srivastava.

• I was thinking that if Southwestern falters this year and the ASC only gets one bid (which they shouldn’t) then California would get the regional hosting job this season. Even with two teams from the ASC, it may end up in Cali.

• Not from my weekend at CMS but wanted to finish with major props to Lewis & Clark going 4-0 with 4 sweeps.