Who punches their tickets to Louisville? The first regional final on tap was in West Lafayette, as Big Ten foes Penn State and Minnesota did battle for the third time this season.
Contrary to what some commentators would have you believe, it is *not* hard to beat a team a third time in a season when you’ve beaten them twice already (such as Penn State have over Minnesota this year). If you’ve beaten them twice, you pretty well have their number. There can be some adjustments and shifting of strategy for seeing the same team a third time, but that works for both sides. The team that won the first two isn’t suddenly helpless to anticipate changes or make any of their own.
After trading points to start the match, the Nittany Lions looked to be denied a kill on the rally at 4-3 Minnesota. The up official ruled that the Gopher back row made a pancake save and…nope. Replays showed it quite obviously wasn’t. But the Nittany Lions did end up winning the rally. They ran out to 8-4 with a huge kill from Katie Slay and a right-side double block to get Minnesota coach Hugh McCutcheon to call time.
The Gophers continually fed their top scorer, Puerto Rican true freshman Daly Santana early and often. For the most she came through, but a wide hit on 12-8 gave the Nittany Lions their first 5-point lead. There were lots of big jump-servers on both sides of the net, with Santana, Penn State’s star setter Micha Hancock, and Katherine Harms all putting the ball into play with heavy authority. Both sides did quite well on service reception, though, able to receive cleanly and set up their offenses.
Penn State’s 5-point advantage held steady. At 16-11, Minnesota setter Mia Tabberson (sporting a different hairstyle than she has in her photo on the Gophers’ website…I hope she keeps this one) effectively set for Ariel Scott on the other side of the net, allowing a pretty easy point. Megan Courtney ended the string of sideout volleyball with a back-row kill on 20-15, her third of the set (at least), to put Penn State up by 6. Coach McCutcheon called time again there, presumably to discuss second set strategy. At 23-18, Penn State libero Dominique Gonzalez was called for a rather painful double hit, as she tried to bump the ball but it wound up rebounding off her face. Their 7-point lead closed to 4, Coach Russ Rose called time for the Nittany Lions. Right out of the timeout, Penn State made it to set point with a great left-side double block, and who else but Courtney would be the one to finish it off 25-19.
Penn State ran out to a quick lead in set number two. Hancock’s service ace at 2-0 wound up landing behind the Minnesota bench (after rebounding off the Gopher back row, of course). There were just service errors galore in this second set, with both sides spotting the other points. Service errors aren’t the end of the world – usually they happen with effective servers who seven or eight times out of ten either get an ace or the opposing side out of system. But when they happen on first service after a sideout, it sure is a kick in the ass.
Out of Minnesota’s timeout at 7-3, they closed the gap with Tori Dixon scoring a kill on a nice slide play and a netball hitting error from the Nittany Lions. A big right-side double block and a service ace from setter Alexandra Palmer brought the set even at 8 before the Gophers took the lead with a hitting error from Deja McClendon straight into the net. Harms’ kill from the right side made it 10-8 Gophers, and Coach Rose decided it was time to put the run on pause. But it was pause and not stop, as the run extended to 14-8 before the Nittany Lions finally sided out. It was an 11-1 run. Just as quickly, though, Ashley Wittman got the Gophers back on serve and back up by 6 with a funky little right side kill that rebounded off the top of the net before going down.
The Gophers fully asserted themselves by going up 7, on an ace from libero Morgan Bohl, a converted outside hitter. At 17-10, Hancock tried to send it over on 2, but she tipped her hand and Dixon was there for an absolutely smothering solo block. Penn State called time again, shockingly trailing in the set by 8. The lead got as big as 9, at 19-10, 21-12, and 23-14. The Nittany Lions, chiefly behind Ariel Scott on the right side, did eat into the advantage a bit, but the Gophers still took the set 25-19. It was the first set the Nittany Lions had lost since a four-set win over Purdue on November 17.
The third set was a stalemate until Penn State took the first 2-point advantage at 8-6. But on this play, Ashley Wittman was hurt, landing awkwardly on her right leg after jumping for a block attempt. She lay on the ground for a moment in obvious pain, though she did get up and exit to her team’s bench under her own power. It was the second time I can recall the air being collectively sucked out of a gymnasium, but luckily it had a nicer resolution than the first time. Trainers attended to Wittman’s ankle at the bench area.
With McClendon firing darts from the left side, Penn State ran out to a 4-point edge at 12-8 at Minnesota’s timeout. The Gophers didn’t sideout until 14-8 (to 14-9) as McClendon scored twice again after the timeout. Minnesota then went on a big run to knot the set at 15, ending with a big swing from the left side by Santana. Penn State responded with three in a row to go ahead 18-15, but the Gophers evened it again at 19 to prompt Coach Rose to call time. Dixon scored on a slide play straight out of the timeout to continue Minnesota’s run and give the Gophers their first lead of the set.
At 22-21, Minnesota started to celebrate what appeared to be a winning block, but the ball came back to them. Fortunately for them, they still won the rally with a kill. You can bet Coach McCutcheon had words with them about it at the subsequent timeout (called by Penn State), though. The Nittany Lions drew the set even at 23 coming out of the timeout, prompting McCutcheon to call his second and final. Penn State, though, got to set point first with a kill from Hancock. Dana Knudsen staved it off with a right side kill to send us to extra points. McClendon’s big block of Harms on the left side gave Penn State another set point at 25-24, and Ariel Scott ended it with a huge kill from the opposite antenna to put the Nittany Lions up 2-1.
Penn State came out big in the fourth set, with a 4-0 run on Hancock’s serve before Minnesota called time (culminating with an ace). Harms finally sided the Gophers out at 5-1. At 9-4, Minnesota rotated Wittman back in for the first time since she got hurt – and she scored with a solid kill through a single block on the left side. Guess she was all right! The Gophers ran the set back to 9-8 before Slay’s kill (yeah, yeah) got the Nittany Lions back on serve. At 10-9, Minnesota got Alexandra Palmer, behind whom they had a big run in set 2, on serve. 10-9 was a fascinating point with both sides looking out of system – the Nittany Lions made a great run to keep a wayward ball alive, and the Gophers could only respond with a hit set up by a running bump set (not the most controlled thing in the world). But the Gophers did win the point, and the run extended to 13-10 in Minnesota’s favor before Coach Rose called time.
The Nittany Lions ran it even at 14, with big kills from Scott and another ace off the tape from Hancock, her fifth ace of the match. Penn State took the lead back when Hancock’s next serve gave an all too easy opening for Scott on an overpass. Minnesota took their final timeout of the set there. Perhaps the timeout effectively iced her, as the first serve back went well long to tie the set again at 15. 15-all was one of the better rallies in the match, ending with (who else?) Scott slamming it home on the right side for Penn State. It was her 24th kill of the match. Penn State went up 2 again at 19-17 following a wide hit from the Gopher left side. McClendon’s big solo block on the left side made it a 3-point advantage at 21-18, and the Nittany Lions then ran off 3 straight to get to match point at 24-18. McClendon ended it with a kill that the Minnesota libero Bohl just couldn’t keep alive.
#1 Penn State d. #8 Minnesota (25-19, 19-25, 26-24, 25-18)
Minnesota had their chances. This Penn State team is not unbeatable. But when the third set slipped through their fingers, it was all but over. To their credit, the Gophers did come back well in set four after falling behind early, such that I briefly wondered if we might be bound for a decider. But Deja McClendon just put the hammer down at the end of the fourth set. McClendon’s originally from Louisville, and now she gets to go back there for the Final Four.
And I’d love to be able to say I saw the rest of the matches live, but…I didn’t 🙁 They happened to fall into a gap of what I’m able to see live via computer or TV. All I could do was keep tabs on a ticker. It did, however, allow me to watch the D-II national championship match live, which was a nice consolation prize. The matchup was Tampa against five-time defending national champions Concordia-St. Paul, who I’ve gushed about before.
Tampa are actually the most recent school other than Concordia to win the national championship – which they did back in 2006. This is a rematch of the 2010 national championship match, won of course by Concordia, and there five members of the Tampa squad this year that played in that match as well as two from Concordia. Tampa have dropped just one set so far in this tournament. Concordia have dropped three, including one in each of their matches in Pensacola, but I don’t think it would be too controversial to say they’ve faced much stronger competition than have the Spartans.
Tampa got on the board right away with an effective serve leading to an overpass for their front line to eat up. They took a quick 4-1 lead behind their 6-foot-2 middle blocker Danielle Selkridge. On Concordia’s serve at 5-3, the Spartan pass wound up hitting one of the lights hanging over the court. The ball was automatically whistled dead for a point to the Bears. A fine rally on 6-4 Tampa ended with an anticlimactic double hit call. After drawing within one a few times only to see the Spartans side out again, the Bears drew even at 8 with a kill from the middle by Michelle Graham. Just as quickly, the Spartans ran back to 11-8, with a left-side hitting error giving them their equal largest lead of the set.
Concordia again drew to within one, and the teams played sideout volleyball for an extended string. Concordia finally knotted it again at 17 with an attack error on the Spartan side (which might have been their first of the set). Graham scored with a big kill from the middle to put the Golden Bears on top for the first time in the set, prompting Tampa’s timeout. The Bears took the first point back to go up two at 19-17, but then Tampa tied it again at 20 with a roll shot from Jessica Yingling at about the 3-meter line. The string of sideouts continued at that point.
Concordia got the first set point after a Tampa net violation, prompting the Spartans’ second timeout. The Spartans staved it off, then the next at 25-24, and the third at 26-25. At 27-26, it appeared the Golden Bears had won the set on a hitting error, but the call was changed to a touch on the Concordia side, making it 27-all. The Spartans got their first set point afterward when a carry was called on the Golden Bears. The set went to the Spartans on a hitting error on the Concordia side – the Golden Bears front line looked like they wanted a touch called against the Spartans like had been called against them, but no such luck.
Tampa ran out to the early lead in set two at 4-1 — exactly as they had in the first set. But this time they increased it a further point before the Golden Bears could side out. Much like at the end of the first set, when neither side was able to put any kind of a scoring run together, Concordia could only eat into the lead little by little. They pulled within a point at 9-8.
On that point, Selkridge scored a funny-looking kill. It appeared that she was jumping to bluff a hit, but she may have actually whiffed a planned hit with her right hand. No matter – she dinked it over with her left before her jump even reached its apex, sneaking the ball in for a kill. The Golden Bears drew the set even at 13, notably when Selkridge was off the court. But the Spartans got the next 3 even without their big star on the front line, taking a pretty decisive advantage at Concordia’s timeout. It was only two points later when the Golden Bears burned their second, after a double contact call gave the Spartans their biggest lead of the match at 18-13. Only a Spartan service error on 20-13 ended the run, and only momentarily. Tampa just poured it on, to a dominant 25-17 final, with Selkridge providing the exclamation point.
Concordia finally started a set on top, with their leading scorer Ellie Duffy scoring on a left side roll shot on the first rally on set 3. They later took what might have been their first 3-point lead of the match at 5-2. For the first time, the Golden Bear block looked to have some kind of an answer against Selkridge, and after they rejected her on 6-2, Tampa called time.
The Spartans came out of the timeout rejuvenated, and matched Concordia’s 6-2 run to start the set to knot it at 8. Concordia responded with three straight, culminating with a big middle block. Tampa’s subsequent sideout brought Selkridge back in on rotation, and she made her presence felt. A fiercely competitive third set was again drawn even at 15 on a Tampa right-side block. Concordia called time when they fell behind for the first time in a while at 16-15. With Selkridge taken out of the equation a bit, Tampa turned to Holly Reschke for their offense in the third. Her kill to put the Spartans ahead 17-16 was her 15th of the match, to tie Selkridge, on zero errors. Kayla Koenecke, to lead the Golden Bears with her 13th, got the set even again at 19. At 21-20 Tampa, a hit from Selkridge rebounded off the Concordia defender to hit the lights above the court. Earlier that was an automatic dead ball, but this time they played on. It made no difference, as the Spartans won the point anyway.
As it wore on, this third set really started to resemble the first, with ties at every numeral score past 20. Concordia got set point at 24-23 with a big left-side kill from Duffy, her 13th. Unlike the first, however, Concordia converted their first set point to take the win and send us to a fourth.
Tampa came out strong in the fourth, just as they did in the first two sets. From 3-2, Selkridge really asserted herself with a quick set play for a kill and a stifling solo block up the middle. Concordia managed to cut the deficit to a point at 9-8, showing again that nothing was coming easy in this match. The Tampa setter Sloane Bâby (pronounced “Bobby”) kept the set from coming tied with a dandy dink play, something that didn’t happen much in the match all together. No matter for the Golden Bears, as on Duffy’s serve they ran the set even at 11. Tampa edged ahead again when Selkridge rotated back in, but Concordia chipped away at that lead too to tie it at 20 at Tampa’s timeout.
Notably with Selkridge not present, Concordia made a potentially crucial back row attack fault to give Tampa the edge at 23-22. They called their last timeout right after, and sided out with Ashley Murtha from the left side. She then went back to the service line and came up with a beauty, leading to Tampa’s overpass and Cassie Haag‘s smash at the net to make it set point for the Golden Bears. The serve back after Tampa’s timeout wasn’t as good, but Tampa’s normally solid service reception failed them. They could only return a free ball, which Concordia capitalized on to win the set and send us to a race to 15 for the national championship.
Concordia established a 2-point advantage at 3-1, but after a few sideouts the Spartans drew it even at 5. They continually fed the left side, with Selkridgegetting it done. Reschke gave them their first lead of the set on the opposite antenna at 6-5, and then the service ace made it 7-5 Spartans to prompt the Golden Bears’ timeout. Concordia setter Amanda Konetchy found an unguarded net in front of her on the first rally after the timeout to get an easy dink to make it 7-6, but Tampa took the next point to make it 8-6 at the side change. Concordia called time again at 9-6 when Tampa took the first point on opposite sides.
Duffy got Concordia a big sideout coming out of the timeout. When Tampa couldn’t return the serve on 9-7, they called timeout. Extremely close volleyball matches in a fifth set sometimes have a start-stop pace like the waning moments of close basketball matches. Two more aces for Erienne Lauersdorf gave them the lead back at 10-9. Graham’s kill on a right-side slide play made it 11-9, at Tampa’s final timeout. Lauersdorf’s run on serve finally ended after the timeout with a kill from the Tampa middle to make it 11-10. Jen Scholtz came in after the sideout to serve – and delivered an ace on her first service. Concordia made the risky choice to let a very close ball go on the next one, and got the call to go their way, going up 12-11. A left-side kill off the block made it 13-11. Tampa responded with a similar kill to 13-12, and an overpass that Tampa’s left side just destroyed knotted the decider at 13.
With Duffy denied at the net, Tampa got national championship point first. The Golden Bears staved it off, and then got their own championship point with Graham’s kill. Murtha ended the match on the Golden Bears’ first championship point to prove this school’s amazing story wasn’t finished yet.
Concordia-St. Paul d. Tampa (27-29, 17-25, 25-23, 25-23, 16-14)
I mean what am I supposed to say after a match like that? Incredible. Just incredible. Even that fails to do it justice. I thought Concordia were dead in the water after they lost the great first set and kind of played like crap in the second. Then to come back and win three two-point sets…this one sure could have gone either way. Tampa are a much better team than I expected to see. Hats off to them big time.
Six straight national titles. I can barely even wrap my head around that. If they continue the run next year, it’ll be the longest such run in college volleyball history. Only one other program has had six in a row, and it happened at the D-III level, when Washington-St. Louis won it all each year from 1991 to 1996. They also won in 1989, the only interruption to a multi-year period of dominance for UC San Diego (who are now a D-II school), meaning they might have even had 8 in a row if a few breaks went their way. Who freaking knows how long this Concordia run will last.
I wonder if they wish they could move up to Division I in volleyball. A few schools maintain isolated Division I programs while the rest of their sports are in Division II or III (the most notable example is Colorado College, as they have two such programs at their school, men’s ice hockey and women’s soccer). Rule changes in recent years (with schools such as CC grandfathered in to keep their current status) make any new schools doing so essentially impossible, though. It’s still permitted, but only if the entire athletics program adheres to D-I rules and regulations, and that costs a ton of money. If any school ever did it, it would be in football or men’s basketball. Those are the only sports where you might be able to get enough money in to make it worth it. Even in volleyball-crazy Minnesota, it would never be worth it in a practical sense.
But come on…don’t you think they could be competitive in the Mid-American Conference or the Horizon League, or something? I wonder if it’s starting to get old hat to them (or at least, to the coach, since the players rotate out) – can the 6th one really be as special as the first?
D-I gleanings
From following the ticker, Oregon/Nebraska was something of a curious match. Nebraska handily won the first set, 25-15. From an early stalemate, they went on a couple of scoring runs, including a 6-1 run to make it 15-7. Meghan Haggerty and Gina Mancuso both provided repeated kills, Haggerty getting three in a row at one point. The lead first extended to 10 at 22-12 before the Huskers finished it off.
And from there, it was all Ducks. They came out really strong in the second, taking six of the first eight points. Pac-12 Player of the Year Alaina Bergsma asserted herself with back-to-back kills early on. Nebraska did briefly take the lead at 12-11, but Oregon answered by going up three and maintaining that edge to the end of the set. Nebraska’s only lead in set 3 was 1-0. A long string of sideouts was broken by a three-point run for the Ducks to get to 9-6, and they never looked back. They had other little three and four-point runs at the set wore on to eventually win by seven.
In the fourth set, something went badly wrong for the Huskers as it went on. After a back-and-forth open, they held a lead at 15-13…and then scored just two of the final 14 points, including none of the last six. Oregon punched their ticket to Louisville in style with a service ace capping off their (15-25, 25-22, 25-18, 25-17) win. They will now face Penn State.
I wonder….I really do wonder….if Oregon’s gonna turn to Oregon State at all for advice. The Beavers are one of just two teams to beat the Nittany Lions this season. Obviously they’ll consult the game tape, but if the Ducks coach put in a call to the Beavers coach, would he want to help? Surprisingly, the Final Four will be my first direct look at the Ducks this season. Lousy Pac-12 Network.
Then over in Austin, the Texas Longhorns absolutely dominated USC. USC actually scored first in all three sets, but once the Longhorns took the lead they never relinquished it. They hit a whopping .424 for the match, to USC’s still-pretty-good .243. They had 50 kills in three sets with just 8 attack errors. Haley Eckerman and Sha’Dare McNeal both had good matches, but it was Bailey Webster who was truly off the chain, at 17/2/29 for a goofy .517 attack percentage against one of the better defensive teams in the nation. In an interesting statistical oddity, the Trojans had no double blocks in this match, but did have three solos, one each for Samantha Bricio, Hayley Crone, and Sara Shaw. It was sort of clownshoes defense for the first two sets, and then the Trojans never challenged in the third, going 9/8/34 as a team in that stanza for just an .029 attack percentage. The final score was (25-19, 25-22, 25-14).
But the Trojans will be back. Bet on it. They lose three seniors to graduation, but only one of them (Katie Fuller) saw regular playing time this season. Bricio, lest we forget, was a freshman this season, and at times she played like one. A little more experience under her belt, and the girl is gonna be straight-up scary good.
And then in the nightcap out in Berkeley…well, let’s just say when you’ve made as many predictions as I have, one of them was bound to come true. So bearing in mind only the time when I said “this seems like a good year for an unseeded team to make the Final Four,” I look like a freaking genius! 😉 What’s that? I also said Michigan had no chance? Forget about that. They advance past Stanford tonight in a four-setter where all four sets had the same 25-20 score (Stanford won the first set, Michigan the next three). Michigan hit .266 for the match, but .328 in sets 2 through 4.
At the beginning of the tournament, this result would have been a huge shock, but I’m not so sure it is now. Michigan have proved themselves. Tennessee are a very good team. Louisville are a very good team. They sort of got a cushy Sweet 16 draw against Michigan State, but the Spartans had to beat UCLA to get to Berkeley. And we should not forget that Stanford regularly started 4 freshmen this season. They were 4 of the best players in the nation, of any class, but experience has got to mean something at the end of the day.
Give the Wolverines all the credit in the world — they’re not “happy just to have made it this far.” And they won’t feel that way in Louisville, either, despite the fact that the Final Four appearance is the first in the history of Michigan volleyball. They’re gonna play loose and relaxed, because they have absolutely nothing to lose and absolutely everything to gain. They weren’t supposed to make it this far — hell, I had them losing in the first round in my bracket. Really, I had them losing every round this tournament (except the Sweet 16, which I viewed as a toss-up). And I will again for their Final Four matchup against Texas. Something tells me that’s just how the Wolverines like it.
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