Go take a look. I'll wait. Wow, that was a quick visit. Where are we? We're 28th with 104 votes. 28th. Excuse me? I'm pretty shocked to say the least. Where did Long Beach and Santa Clara come from? (2 programs I'm going to go check out when I finish this entry.)
It's no surprise that Nebraska is on top, nor is it a suprise that Hawaii is ranked 10. The discussion hasn't really started over at the Volleytalk boards so it'll be interesting to see what they say. One person has already stated that Florida and UCLA are too low, USC is too high.
I'll be interested in seeing what Coach Jordan has to say.
posted by Melanie Brooks @ 12:27 PM
4 Comments:
Not surprised to see NMSU not included. The AVCA poll tends to take history into account and the usual suspects are always on the list. It’s harder for a new team to break the top 25 in the preseason poll, but NMSU has their chances against Utah and Duke.
Santa Clara returns 4 starters and their libero and Long Beach returns 5 starters and their libero. So, they return a great deal of fire power from their offense. Santa Clara lost their main offensive weapon, however they return a very strong supporting cast and a lot of players that saw playing time. They have some very strong depth which makes them a very dangerous team because there a lot of players to scout.
Long Beach returns an AA middle in Crimes. She is a dominant middle but Long Beach had injuries in the past few years which weakened the supporting cast around her. Long Beach lacks some strong fire power on the outsides but overall, they are a solid team.
You're right. We lost 3 solid players to graduation. We've got a lot of new talent on the team that hasn't proven themselves yet. I guess 28th is good to start out the season with!
I would add, that you lost 3 pivotal players - setter, 2 starting left side/primary passers. When your best returning players are middle blockers and defensive specialist/libros and you got unproven setter and passers, that's very iffy. Your MBs will be unutilized if you can't get the ball to them. Also, losing to middle of the road Colorado and the end of last season didn't help. Most voters tend to focus on post season play.
Also, wasn't serving one of your main weapons last year? And the two best servers (Choi, Borden) are gone.
Post a Comment
<< Home