Volleyball 2014

[original sin]

The volleyball team traveled to the Dunes to take on The Fighting Irish in spring ball and came away with a 3-2 win.

[valpospartan]

The volleyball team traveled to the Dunes to take on The Fighting Irish in spring ball and came away with a 3-2 win.

[original sin]

Emily Chittum (S/DS), Sophmore from Texas will not be returning this fall. Reasons are unknown.

[valpotx]

Hard to say if this will hurt us or not, as FR rarely play within Coach Avery's system (6 sets played in 4 matches last year), unless they are an absolute star from the beginning. We don't have much turnover in our volleyball group, and we have other quality players, so this doesn't worry me.  The only star I remember losing was when Amy Palash transferred to the Illini after her SO year.

Edit: I went to her Facebook page, and there isn't anything there that says anything of value.  Looking at her page, it makes me so afraid to have a daughter in the future, though I do want one now that I have a son.  Her page is very much what teenage girls post nowadays, lots of bikini pics and guys telling her how hot she is.  I do not look forward to this aspect of possibly having a daughter...

[LaPorteAveApostle]

Just raise them well.

My wife has already decreed that our daughter won't ever be playing volleyball simply because of the ridiculous uniforms--and she's right.

[VULB#62]

Beach Volleyball, right LAA?  That's where they wear bikinis.

[LaPorteAveApostle]

Yeah, that's even worse. 

I do mean gym volleyball.  There's no reason they have to play in their underpants indoors.

[original sin]

REALLY! Well let's all thank God that there are no wrestling or swim teams to also cast impure thoughts into impressionable minds.

[LaPorteAveApostle]

Actually, swim trunks are more modest these days than some other sport uniforms.  When did you ever see a female swimmer in the Olympics don a bikini?  And cf. the male swimmers' tendency away from the Speedo to the more aerodynamic suit (although for a while it seemed guys would just wear whatever Phelps wore to be 'like mike').

Face it, form should follow function, not pander.  If volleyball uniforms were really necessary for performance, then why do female basketball players actually wear shorts instead of underpants?  Basketball is not nearly as confined or confining a sport...

[VULB#62]

Then there's today's female track uniforms.  Long sleeve, crew neck volleyball uniforms are conservative in comparison.

[LaPorteAveApostle]

Well, I let it slide in the previous post, but I can't twice:

"Well, so-and-so does this-n-that" is not an acceptable argument when we're not talking about so-and-so.

If we're talking about whether Scott Brown should have done the some stupid things he did when he was younger, you can't say "Well, Ted Kennedy basically killed a girl and got away with it!" simply because they were both Massachusetts senators. It's asking your beautician to become a ginger:  you're committing a red hair-ing.

(Besides, if very few people care about volleyball, even fewer give two @#% about female track.  There are probably more VU football fans than women's track aficionados. Thus, I haven't seen the uniforms to even know whether to complain about them.  Then again, I didn't say I wouldn't allow my daughter to run track--I said I wouldn't allow her to play volleyball on teams that declare pants to be a hindrance.  See the previous paragraph.)

If volleyball "shorts" were necessary to performance, then other sports would wear them too.  I've seen more coverage from a VU defensive backfield versus Grand Valley State circa 1990.

[a3uge]

Volleyball uniforms aren't that much different than what most girls wear every day - yoga pants.

[valpopal]

[tweet]489138243133505536[/tweet]

[original sin]

The schedule is milquetoast at best. Twenty wins should be a given with coaching and talent.

[VULB#62]

That was my thought as well, but I also thought, maybe this schedule will enable Carin to:  focus on the HL,  keep the whole team fresher for the HL season by allowing her to play more kids more often and be more competitive in the tournament.  Does that make sense?

[vu72]

Well, the Volleyball team isn't likely to make the sports "playoffs", as they did with a win over Iowa last year.  Somehow consecutive wins of Campbell, Wofford and NC Central doesn't quite have the same ring.

[VULB#62]

But the slam on the program is that the season record is good, but we never seem to win the HL. There is no RPI in volleyball, so maybe this is a strategic  adjustment to get to where we need to be to get into the NCAA 1st round.  Just wondering.....

[original sin]

Actually there is an RPI ranking as well as the Pablo ranking for volleyball. It ranks all 300+ teams.

[VULB#62]

Thanks for the info.  I guess I was alluding to the fact that for Valpo it's win the HL tournament or nothing NCAA-wise.  RPI is not a consideration for Valpo in making the tournament (but maybe in seeding once you're in).

[KL31NY]

RPI really doesn't mean squat to Horizon League volleyball unless there's a team that's good enough to earn an at-large bid to the NCAAs. Usually, the cutoff for that is somewhere in the 40s, and most of the at-large bids easily get snatched by major conference teams. HL hasn't had any at-large teams with the exception of the 1999-2000 Milwaukee Panthers. You would need an incredibly good team that nearly wins out, with a great non-conference schedule, that lays an egg in the HL finals to have a chance to sneak into the party, and even then, you need to challenge the other HL teams to schedule tough non-league matches to help the league's RPI and assist the RPI of any top team that might come around...

[original sin]

Valpo's RPI in 2013 was 103, right above Wake Forest and right below Fresno St.

http://web1.ncaa.org/app_data/weeklyrpi/2013WVBrpi1.html

[original sin]

Out of Conference teams overview: RPI average, 221 out of 332. High-106, Toledo. Low-326, North Carolina Cent., 326.
                                                2013 Records. Overall 206-312. Average 12-18. Highs 19-12, 19-14. Lows 2-29, 3-25.

I know, too much time on my hands.

[original sin]

2-1 to start the season. Random thoughts: Good to see everyone played. Surprising to see a couple of freshman starting in a few of the matches. Freshman from Illinois will have a medical redshirt.

Home opener this Wednesday.

[valpopal]

Congrats to Kelsey Berrington and Emily Campbell! Both were named to the NCCU Invitational All-Tournament team this weekend.

[original sin]

Home opener tonight with IUPUI and wouldn't be surprised to see the match go five. Very unsettled lineup with the three previous matches. Hope to see a good crowd tonight.