This is more for the players. I will not sugar coat it. Please do not read if you unable to take some hard truth.
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I am trying to catch up with grading, finish watching film and update stats, get ready for hosting the conference meeting, taking a lot of questions about club, and start cleaning up volleyball papers and stuff that are scattered around the house. Not really slowed down since Saturday yet.
But something I want to make sure I pay attention to is to thank the parents and the players for having the chance to coach these girls. We had so much fun on the court and off. We also really pushed them on and up the court. I fear that they may not understand how I struggled with the demands of enjoying them as girls and high school athletes who had a fantastic season with the demands that many of them face if they hope to play college volleyball, especially those that want to play at a fairly competitive level with competitive programs. Drove over to see the gym, confirm my previous notes on Covington, and jot some quick notes on Fountain Central.
The gym is nicer than I had been led to believe. I wish the lighting was a little brighter, but it is adequate. Plenty of good seating. It is worthy of a sectional site. Covington is 28-4 after thumping Rossville. No changes in the rotations for Covington from what I copied down at Benton Central a month ago. Brooke Ahrens, #2, put on a show! She is listed at 5'6, but is appears taller, 5'8 maybe, when I stood next to her. What an explosive athlete. In the set and a half we charted, she was 8-1/11= .636. WOW! And after going cross court at BC, she went heavy to the line. In addition she added in a big way to her 103 aces. HEAVY top spin jump serve. What worries me even more is their freshmen middle hitter, #12, is more advanced than what we saw at Benton Central. If their stats are right, she had 11 attack errors for the year. She is hitting .517 with 146 kills. She has also missed ONE serve out of 216 service attempts! Toss in the fact that their libero is 2nd in the state in digs and is aced only 6% of the time and we have a tough road to hoe. Had the chance to chart Fountain Central who plays Covington in the 1st game Saturday morning. This will be the 4th meeting this season between the county rivals. Covington has won all 3 matches, but Central keeps it interesting. First meeting was Covington in three at 19, 14, 18. Next was Covington 25-17, 23-25, and 15-13. A barn burner! The last meeting was Covington 25-21 and 25-12. E. Eurit passed 2.0. M. Herr passed 1.89. Then it gets ugly. G. Filbrun passed 1.33. L. Eller passed 1.28. R. Conn passed 1.14. L. McClain passed 1.12. Fisher passed 1.0. M. McGill & L. Worl passed 0.83. This is two days in a row that L. Worl passed horrendous!
This is a quick entry tonight.
We want to recognize L. Eller for her effort at Tipton, which resulted in a school record 59 digs. That effort has Libby ranked 6th in the state in digs. We want to recognize M. Herr for breaking a record and equaling a record. First, she broke B. Worl's record for hitting percent by hitting .581 on 12 swings against Frankton. Then she equaled B. Worl's record for kills in a match with 29 against Tipton. We want to recognize Meg. Miller for breaking B. Worl's record for hitting percent. Bailey hit .290 her senior year. Meghan will hit .326 (65-21/135). Lastly, even though it was not a record equaling effort, G. Filbrun came within one set of E. Eurit's 43 assists record with 42 in the 5 set win over Tipton. Name: Miller, Madison Parents: Jamey and Chrissy Miller Nicknames: Madwoman or Maddawg You are about to get on an airplane for a long flight. You are in your seat and a voice says, "Excuse me, I have the seat next to you. You look up and nearly faint when (fill in the blank) Chuck Bass sits next to you. Name three groups whose music pumps you up to do your best. 1. Drake 2. Trey Songz 3. J. Cole What is your favorite season of the year and why? "Fall, because its volleyball season and I like the weather." What do you see yourself doing in five years? "Finishing up my senior year of college." In the past year, who is the best volleyball player you have played against (proper noun not needed)? Why? "The girl from Buchanan. She hit like a beast." Recall one of your most embarrassing memories of playing volleyball. "Getting hit in the face with the ball." You are the coach. What is something you would never make your team do that one of your coaches makes/made you do. "I would never make my team run everyday in the heat, but I would still make them run some." You have been a bad girl and will be stranded on an island all alone for six months. It is a nice island with cool breezes and a warm sun all year. Nice house but there is just enough electricity one extra electrical appliance. Basic food is provided. Tell us what you are taking. "I would like my cell phone, internet connection, ice cream, my pillow, and a volleyball." Name: Sidney Fisher Parents: Jodi and Kendall Fisher Nicknames: Sea Monster, Fish, Fishy, and Sid. You are about to get on an airplane for a long flight. You are in your seat and a voice says, "Excuse me, I have the seat next to you. You look up and nearly faint when (fill in the blank) Taylor Swift sits next to you. Name three groups whose music pumps you up to do your best. 1. Fetty Wap 2. Lil Jon 3. Nicki Minaj What is your favorite season of the year and why? "Summer because the weather is warm, no school, and my birthday is in June. What do you see yourself doing in five years? "I see myself at IU getting my degree in Nursing." In the past year, who is the best volleyball player you have played against (proper noun not needed)? Why? "The libero from Tri-Central. It was fun to watch her dig almost every ball hit at her." Recall one of your most embarrassing memories of playing volleyball. "Getting hit in the face in serve receive at the Frankfort Tournament." You are the coach. What is something you would never make your team do that one of your coaches makes/made you do. "I would make us run every week [you just made an enemy in Megan Herr] and watch more film." You have been a bad girl and will be stranded on an island all alone for six months. It is a nice island with cool breezes and a warm sun all year. Nice house but there is just enough electricity one extra electrical appliance. Basic food is provided. Tell us what you are taking. "I would take my swim suit, pizza, coke, my phone, and wifi." Since the injury to Meg. Miller, we have gone 6-3. Not bad at all. Disappointing, but not bad. Still, we lost only once prior to her injury. Is their any correlation?
I have started to look at why we struggling to beat the good teams (Jay County and Frontier) and even bad ones (Eastern). As I break down the film and comb through stats three things are showing up. Two are not related to Meghan's injury and one is. Western (8-13) is on a nice roll winning four in a row. They went through their own "boom" moment switching to a freshman setter and it appears to be paying off. Here are some things to watch as the match unfolds.
Their offense revolves around two kids: #10, CIViC player S. Rogers, has 139 kills and is hitting .199. However, she is on fire during the win streak hitting over .300 with a .562 mark vrs. Peru. Oh my! Right behind her is #8, B. Amsbury who is hitting .161 with 109 kills. Our block will be keyed to them. The switch at setter to #7, K. Shepherd, appears to be a huge success. She sits at 185 sets, but the switch is not very old and the win streak is timed to that switch. When they serve, they have a couple kids we need to be aware of regarding potential runs. E. Jones, #11, has an ace-to-error ratio of 4.14:1. That would be right there with our best two servers. The setter is at 3.66:1. Sophie is not chopped liver at 1.87:1. When we serve, we have a couple of different girls we want to target. In addition, it appears that #8, B. Amsbury is a swing hitter. We always want to investigate how a swing hitter's offense is impacted by handling a numbers of balls. Keys? 1.) Do not miss serves. If we serve well, I think we can keep Western largely out of system, which helps with goal one. 2.) Do not let their M1 go off. Sophie is hitting .395 during the win streak! That is going off! Defense has to be strong. |
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October 2023
AuthorVarsity Coach Denny Crum |