West Region Top 10 (2/9/21)

Alright, one of the problems with the Top 10 is that we have to do this weekly. So, even though there weren’t many matches played, here is the update

My Rank, (my rank last week), record, key results last week

1 (1) Trinity 0-0 W: None; L; None. 2 (2) Colorado College 0-0 W: None; L: None. 3 (3) Southwestern 0-0 W: None; L: None. 4 (4) Pacific Lutheran 2-0 W: Puget Sound (2); L: None. 5 (5) UT-Dallas 0-0 W: None; L: None. 6 (7) Mary Hardin-Baylor 0-0 W: None; L: None. 7 (6) Puget Sound 0-2 W: None; L: PLU (2). 8 (8) George Fox 0-0 W: None; L: None. 9 (9) Dallas 0-0 W: None; L: None. 10 (10) LeTourneau 3-0 W: HSU; L: None. Dropped Out: None.

This won’t be a long article with so little to talk about. If you want to see my reasoning for these teams, please look at last week’s Top 10.

For this week, I got to see on the stream three of the teams – PLU, Puget Sound and LeTourneau. Two teams considered last week also played in ETBU and Hardin-Simmons.

I thought PLU looked pretty good and I feel more confident with their #4 ranking. If either Colorado College or Southwestern trip up then they are primed to move past them. Consistent play from the Lutes but the story has to be their freshmen. I’ve mentioned in the past that it’s going to be important with so many lost athletes this year to have your freshmen step up and PLU has that after two matches. Two of their top three hitters in points are freshmen in Sianna Iverson and Breeze Bartle. PLU also returned a wonderful core that is also producing early.

I dropped Puget Sound down a spot although I liked the power on display from their team. The issue the first weekend was errors as the coaching staff inserted a lot of players probably in search for the right combinations. You can see the promise here but getting swept in that second match meant some punishment most be doled out.

I didn’t get to see a lot of LeTourneau this week but what I saw lines up with what was on display a couple of weeks ago. Based on how both ETBU and LETU played against Hardin-Simmons, you can see that LETU is better at this point in the season. Seeing Skylar Fowler on the floor was good after she missed out against Jarvis Christian. Keep an eye on Madison Denega and Natalie Connelly who each had an off match against Hardin-Simmons. If you get these two going with Crow and Fowler then LETU could really have something.

For this week, we’ve got Trinity playing at Austin College and as I’ve said in the past, I just don’t see anyone taking them down this year. Colorado College will play at Schreiner, which is normally a team they can handle well. Two ranked teams in Southwestern and Dallas will play so that should be a fun one. The PLU/Whitman match was postponed so I have to assume that Whitman was the school that had the Covid issue this past weekend. UT-Dallas is still a couple of weeks away from playing. Mary Hardin-Baylor will travel to Howard Payne. I’m interested to see how the Cru filled out their roster this season. Puget Sound will host unranked Whitworth and I have to see a couple of wins here. Whitworth lost basically their entire team so although their track record is really good historically, the Loggers need these wins. George Fox won’t play until next month (hopefully) while LeTourneau hosts Louisiana College. I honestly haven’t looked too much at Louisiana College this season as they are moving out of DIII next season. Did this help their squad in recruiting? We should find out Saturday.

Update: The PLU/Whitman matches were removed from the NWC schedule but are still on the school’s schedules. Just received confirmation that they are playing this weekend. My bad!!!!!