I wasn't planning to write this one up, since in a rare intrusion by this weird thing called 'life' I wasn't able to watch the complete match. But I joined late in the first set, and it was a treat to watch.
GCU held a slender lead in the first as I joined the webcast, and it looked like they were gonna finish it off, reaching 23-20. But IPFW had other ideas. With Rob Samp at the service line, they ran out the set 25-23. A pretty impressive turnaround. According to that win probability chart I found last night (just love it…I will continue to refer to it, no doubt) that has only an 11 percent chance of happening. Not quite so epic as BYU's comeback from 0-2 and 14-19 to win the whole match last night, but still pretty cool. And Coach Ball got to look like a genius going to Keegan Robbins (listed as a setter, but came in to play middle) as a front-row sub at 23-20, with Robbins rewarding him with an immediate kill.
IPFW sure played a lot better tonight than they did last night, not least in service reception, which was their big bugaboo Friday night. Second set was a pretty long stretch of sideout volleyball, with GCU holding the small advantage. They took the first point on serve anyone had since midway through the set to gain set point at 24-21. IPFW staved it off and got the sideout, and who would rotate back to the service line but Samp. The Volleydons staved off one, but on 24-23 GCU played a great point. At the end of a fairly long rally, Keith Smith went to the middle (pretty clearly GCU's big strength) with Ryan Mather, but there was a triple block there waiting for him. So instead of going for a big HULK SMASH, Mather instead (and I have to imagine this choice was made in midair) went to a soft roll shot that just glided past the block for the point and second set win for GCU. Great play.
In the third set, it was mostly even until about 11-11 when Jordon Tarantino got two straight service aces and very nearly a third that was just called wide. The GCU PA announcer, who sounded at times like he was gonna pop a blood vessel or something, came up with a catchy call — "Tarantino Unchained!!!!" I like that. That's clever. That works. The third set was also delayed for about six or seven minutes (which doesn't sound like a ton of time, but when you're just standing around doing nothing it sort of is) when the electronic scorekeeping went down (and isn't that why the Super Bowl power outage caused as long a delay as it did?). The girls on commentary (guess I haven't mentioned them yet…it was one of the first times I'd heard women calling men's volleyball and I thought they did well) did a pretty good job of covering the space. Then on Ben Hunt's serve the Antelopes went on a run that had me legitimately worried the PA guy was gonna hurt himself somehow, coming up with several big blocks and kills to run out to a 5-point advantage at 19-14. IPFW ran back to close within 20-18. At 21-18, the Antelopes brought in Jared Goldberg as a serving sub, and the crowd must really like him, because they got into it, chanting his name. Tarantino brought the Antelopes to set point and the announcer did his "Tarantino Unchained!" line again. I always tried not to repeat my 'clever' calls, but to each their own. It was Tarantino who finished off the 3rd, 25-21 for the 'lopes. Seven kills and two service aces through three, all pretty timely, is not half bad for a bench player.
The story of the fourth set came about 2/3 of the way through. The set was pretty evenly fought, with a slight advantage to IPFW as they led 17-14. Grand Canyon got the sideout, and Ben Ponnet went back to the service line. The flagger called his serve out, but the up referee overruled her and awarded Tarantino the ace. IPFW Coach Arnie Ball was clearly upset by the call, and protested it. He was assessed a yellow card, which was an automatic additional point for the Antelopes. Ball called timeout, and during that timeout (I think..?) he was assessed a red card. That's not an additional point (contrary to what the scorekeeper evidently first thought), but it did mean Ball was ejected from the remainder of the set.
And he, as you shouldn't need me to tell you, wasn't too happy about that. He stormed out of the gym, cursing (I don't mean profanity, I mean tone) the officials as he went, mumbling about how he's been doing this for 35 years and to get ejected on a call like that, and so on and so forth. I have to say I agree with him. This is the first time I've ever seen a red card assessed in a volleyball match, and I have no idea what caused it.
Grand Canyon d. IPFW (23-25, 25-23, 25-21, 25-19)
The Volleydons were lost without Ball on the sideline, and the Antelopes' 8-2 final run quickly finished off the match. Jordon Tarantino concluded a pretty nice match by serving it out from 20-19.
And sure, the Antelopes took control as the match wore on, but the story is the red card to Coach Ball. There's got to be more to it than him just giving the officials the business a bit about a call that went against his side. That maybe gets a yellow card if it's coming from a first-year assistant. Coming from Arnie Ball? You let him say his peace, tell him to simmer down, and he will. Because, as he said, he's been there doing it for 35 years. You can't have a hair trigger against him. You just can't.
Something else must have happened. Something else to cause Coach Ball to blow his top (though he only became especially demonstrative after the red card had already been assessed), because it went yellow card, timeout, red card. What happened? The gals on commentary thought that the officials were kind of losing control of the match as the fourth set wore on and tempers flared. Nothing huge happened at any point, and orderly post-match handshakes were had (you know, as both teams file by the net), but there's gonna be some emotions coming out of this one. No doubt about it.
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