UTVballfan
100+ Posts
On Thursday, the Horns took a field trip to the world’s biggest loony bin, out College Station way. The Texas coaches instructed the freshmen to not feed the patients, er, I mean, students, and said if one gets too close, get behind Brian the volunteer coach, he’s big and, well, he’s expendable and you’re not.
A&M turned out 3,300 deranged but faithful fans. Vocal rascals, too. Hey, they may be non compos mentis, but they aren’t shy. The Aggies play now in Reed Arena, which doesn’t quite achieve the same level of highly concentrated nuttiness and ear-splitting volume as G. Rollie White. Man, would their old place get loud – like Eddie van Halen loud - when they cranked up with the maniacal cheers.
Still, give ‘em credit for another big turnout. Aggie coach Corbelli, aka “Ray of Sunshine”, said after Thursday’s match that the Aggies got a lot of help from the 12th Man, but shouldn’t that be the 7th Woman?
Whatever the cause, the disturbed fans, the loud chants and cheers, whatever, the Horns frequently backslid into error prone ways, and somehow managed 33 errors in 3 sets. That’s bad, quantitatively, qualitatively, and Elliottatively.
Consider the second set, when the Horns were up 11-9. A&M got a kill off a Horns overpass, and then, per the Aggie post-game report, “Texas committed six attack errors over the next seven points, hitting long, wide, into the net and into the block.” Ouch! Now that’s a foot-gun, know what I mean? We got swept, end of story.
I’m sure the Horns were happy to return home yesterday, and 2,600-plus faithful fans took a heart-warming approach of “hate the sin, love the sinner,” and enveloped our team with thunderous cheers.
There were two especially stirring plays against Baylor, both of which were long rallies. The Horns were playing hard, and the fans’ loud roar escalated throughout the long points in approval of our teams’ hustle. Very, very cool.
We were passing a bit better, and as a result had a very well rounded attack, with 5 players with double-digit attempts, and nearly a 6th as well. Rachael and Jen were especially efficient, and I really liked watching Ashley Bannister’s game.
She had an amazing point to tip the scales in a tight first set. We were tied, 23-all; the set came out to Ashley and it was high and far out, very tight to the pin. She didn’t merely thread the needle between the antenna and the block, she crushed it through the needle. Big time play in crunch time. Point texas and we took the set.
We’ve got this rotation where Ashley, Rachael and Sha’Dare are all in the front row. These girls can all terminate. Give us some passing, and that front line is going to do some damage over the next couple years.
Continued props to the new setter. Did you ever know one of those kids whose parents lived on a farm and the house was a mile back from the road, and when the family came home, the kid would beg their parents to let them out at the mailbox so they could run home? Not only for the sheer joy of running, but they’d actually race the car home down the drive? And then they turn into gym rats, and during, say, serving practice, even a loose ball in the corner turns into a race? I think that’s what we’ve got here.
Hannah is a very quick human. Try one time not watching the ball or the other players, just watch her feet. It takes a lot of work and focus to be a good setter: constantly moving, constantly thinking, watching the other team, gauging your own players, making decisions. Hannah seems to be at a strong level already.
Hannah led her high school team to 4 straight state championships. You have to wonder if she’s had volleyball adversity like she’s already faced in the Horns season so far. They say you learn the most in life when things are difficult, in which case, lately her learning curve must be rising exponentially. As in, y=E**x, where E is for Error and the range for x is up to 33. On some of the out of system sequences, I’d think the temptation to scream “this passing blows chunks!” must be overwhelming. Or maybe, “you’ve got to be kidding me, what’s next, boils?” Luckily, she’s apparently got the patience of Job.
Meanwhile, the good news is, the Horns secured the win. We’ve got some big matches coming up. Missou will likely turn out a raucous, Gregory-sized turnout for their match against the Horns, and we’ll see if our young team can find their first win on the road. Make sure you come out and lift our team on the 29th, when no. 11 Iowa State rolls in!!
A&M turned out 3,300 deranged but faithful fans. Vocal rascals, too. Hey, they may be non compos mentis, but they aren’t shy. The Aggies play now in Reed Arena, which doesn’t quite achieve the same level of highly concentrated nuttiness and ear-splitting volume as G. Rollie White. Man, would their old place get loud – like Eddie van Halen loud - when they cranked up with the maniacal cheers.
Still, give ‘em credit for another big turnout. Aggie coach Corbelli, aka “Ray of Sunshine”, said after Thursday’s match that the Aggies got a lot of help from the 12th Man, but shouldn’t that be the 7th Woman?
Whatever the cause, the disturbed fans, the loud chants and cheers, whatever, the Horns frequently backslid into error prone ways, and somehow managed 33 errors in 3 sets. That’s bad, quantitatively, qualitatively, and Elliottatively.
Consider the second set, when the Horns were up 11-9. A&M got a kill off a Horns overpass, and then, per the Aggie post-game report, “Texas committed six attack errors over the next seven points, hitting long, wide, into the net and into the block.” Ouch! Now that’s a foot-gun, know what I mean? We got swept, end of story.
I’m sure the Horns were happy to return home yesterday, and 2,600-plus faithful fans took a heart-warming approach of “hate the sin, love the sinner,” and enveloped our team with thunderous cheers.
There were two especially stirring plays against Baylor, both of which were long rallies. The Horns were playing hard, and the fans’ loud roar escalated throughout the long points in approval of our teams’ hustle. Very, very cool.
We were passing a bit better, and as a result had a very well rounded attack, with 5 players with double-digit attempts, and nearly a 6th as well. Rachael and Jen were especially efficient, and I really liked watching Ashley Bannister’s game.
She had an amazing point to tip the scales in a tight first set. We were tied, 23-all; the set came out to Ashley and it was high and far out, very tight to the pin. She didn’t merely thread the needle between the antenna and the block, she crushed it through the needle. Big time play in crunch time. Point texas and we took the set.
We’ve got this rotation where Ashley, Rachael and Sha’Dare are all in the front row. These girls can all terminate. Give us some passing, and that front line is going to do some damage over the next couple years.
Continued props to the new setter. Did you ever know one of those kids whose parents lived on a farm and the house was a mile back from the road, and when the family came home, the kid would beg their parents to let them out at the mailbox so they could run home? Not only for the sheer joy of running, but they’d actually race the car home down the drive? And then they turn into gym rats, and during, say, serving practice, even a loose ball in the corner turns into a race? I think that’s what we’ve got here.
Hannah is a very quick human. Try one time not watching the ball or the other players, just watch her feet. It takes a lot of work and focus to be a good setter: constantly moving, constantly thinking, watching the other team, gauging your own players, making decisions. Hannah seems to be at a strong level already.
Hannah led her high school team to 4 straight state championships. You have to wonder if she’s had volleyball adversity like she’s already faced in the Horns season so far. They say you learn the most in life when things are difficult, in which case, lately her learning curve must be rising exponentially. As in, y=E**x, where E is for Error and the range for x is up to 33. On some of the out of system sequences, I’d think the temptation to scream “this passing blows chunks!” must be overwhelming. Or maybe, “you’ve got to be kidding me, what’s next, boils?” Luckily, she’s apparently got the patience of Job.
Meanwhile, the good news is, the Horns secured the win. We’ve got some big matches coming up. Missou will likely turn out a raucous, Gregory-sized turnout for their match against the Horns, and we’ll see if our young team can find their first win on the road. Make sure you come out and lift our team on the 29th, when no. 11 Iowa State rolls in!!
