Match Preview – Round 2: Penn State vs. Utah

Saltph42According to Wikimedia Commons, this is the Tree of Utah.

What: Penn State vs. Utah

When: 7:30 p.m. ET

Where: Rec Hall

Media: live stream BTN.com, live stream BTN2go, CBSsports.com’s GameTracker

We don’t know much about the Utah women’s volleyball team — and that’s purely a comment on our failure to properly research this team (and the sad state of labor relations between us and our slacker staff — but that’s a conversation for another day, if they ever come back from what they gleefully refer to as “December Spring Break”) and has nothing to do with the Utah women’s volleyball team.

In fact, Utah is a legitimate opponent for Penn State in tonight’s 2nd Round NCAA Tournament match.  As Penn State head coach Russ Rose  told Gordon Brunskill of the Centre Daily Times, in an interview following last night’s lackluster performance by Penn State against LIU Brooklyn “You don’t walk very far if that’s how you play.  If we play like that against Utah, we’ll probably be disappointed in the outcome.”

Utah defeated Yale on Friday 3-1 (27-29, 25-15, 26-24, 25-16), a match in which they outhit the Bulldogs .342 to .226, and out blocked them 12.0 to 8.0 (Yale basically had no answer for Utah’s middles).  Utah Head Coach Beth Launiere had this to say in the post-match recap:

“It was a typical Utah match for us.  We just had to grind it out tonight. We started out pretty tight in the match, but once we settled down, we played some pretty good volleyball. We ended up hitting .342, which is a nice offensive match. We struggled at times to slow Yale down. I thought they hit very aggressively and we didn’t really have an answer for No. 11 (Yale’s Kelly Johnson). It was a pretty typical match for us, and I was pleased with it.”

How good is Utah?  Below is a quick look at its record, the season stats for selected players, and the team roster.  We think it’s a team that is plenty good enough to give Penn State real problems if Penn State assumes it will win the match (which, in our opinion, is different from knowing you can win the match).

A Totally Subjective View on Utah’s Season: Good Wins — and one scrappy loss (Green), Bad Losses (Red)

2013 Utah Pac-12 Schedule

Utah’s Regular Season Stats

Overall record: 20-12 Conf: 9-11 Home: 8-6 Away: 7-6 Neutral: 5-0

  

  

ATTACK 

SET 

SERVE 

##  Player 

SP 

MP-MS 

K/Set 

TA 

Pct 

A/Set 

SA 

SA/Set 

SE 

19 Cygan, Kendall

125

32-

27

0.22

5

61

.361

695

5.56

18

0.14

23

17 Redd-Brandon, Erin

125

32-

291

2.33

82

657

.318

6

0.05

20

0.16

39

10 Dalton, Shelby

121

32-

324

2.68

104

776

.284

5

0.04

3

0.02

4

3 Bateman, Bailey

121

32-

187

1.55

71

456

.254

5

0.04

0

0.00

3

13 Adolph, Lea

92

28-

2

0.02

0

8

.250

62

0.67

23

0.25

35

6 Odale, Morgan

125

32-

288

2.30

88

834

.240

26

0.21

23

0.18

52

9 Moea’i, Makenzie

103

32-

189

1.83

85

492

.211

5

0.05

5

0.05

7

12 Kirby, Kalee

125

32-

12

0.10

6

40

.150

690

5.52

12

0.10

39

11 Schofield, Chelsey

118

31-

286

2.42

154

924

.143

17

0.14

13

0.11

34

4 Sutton, Tess

73

28-

0

0.00

2

5

-.400

40

0.55

5

0.07

12

  UTAH…………….

125

32-

1696

13.57

631

4522

.236

1552

12.42

123

0.98

249

  Opponents………..

125

32-

1588

12.70

743

4524

.187

1477

11.82

127

1.02

182

 

  

  

  

DIG 

BLOCKING 

  

POINTS 

##  Player 

SP 

RE 

Dig 

Dig/Set 

BS 

BA 

Total 

Blk/Set 

BE 

BHE 

Points 

Pts/Set 

19 Cygan, Kendall

125

0

227

1.82

0

0

0

0.00

1

16

45.0

0.36

17 Redd-Brandon, Erin

125

2

72

0.58

9

166

175

1.40

7

1

403.0

3.22

10 Dalton, Shelby

121

0

69

0.57

3

133

136

1.12

15

1

396.5

3.28

3 Bateman, Bailey

121

2

26

0.21

9

141

150

1.24

7

1

266.5

2.20

13 Adolph, Lea

92

27

243

2.64

0

0

0

0.00

0

2

25.0

0.27

6 Odale, Morgan

125

33

348

2.78

3

50

53

0.42

1

1

339.0

2.71

9 Moea’i, Makenzie

103

2

62

0.60

0

59

59

0.57

8

0

223.5

2.17

12 Kirby, Kalee

125

1

231

1.85

0

1

1

0.01

4

8

24.5

0.20

11 Schofield, Chelsey

118

35

381

3.23

11

65

76

0.64

14

1

342.5

2.90

4 Sutton, Tess

73

15

187

2.56

0

0

0

0.00

0

2

5.0

0.07

  TEAM  

9

                   
  UTAH…………….

125

127

1864

14.91

37

648

361.0

2.89

62

33

2180.0

17.44

  Opponents………..

125

123

1920

15.36

64

377

252.5

2.02

57

21

1967.5

15.74

 

Utah Roster

 
No. Name Ht. Pos. Yr. Hometown Previous School

13

Lea Adolph 5-6 DS/L JR Waltrop, Germany Pascal Gymnasium

3

Bailey Bateman 6-1 MB JR Hooper, Utah Fremont HS

19

Kendall Cygan 5-9 S SO Orange, Calif. Santa Margarita Catholic HS

10

Shelby Dalton 6-1 RS JR Moab, Utah Grand County HS

16

Eden Frazier 6-1 MB SO Irvine, Calif. Woodbridge HS

12

Kalee Kirby 5-7 S JR South Weber, Utah Northern Arizona

5

Alyssa Koenig 6-2 MB FR Arroyo Grande, Calif. Arroyo Grande HS

9

Makenzie Moea’i 6-0 OH JR American Fork, Utah UNLV

6

Morgan Odale 6-1 OH SR Star, Idaho Eagle HS

17

Erin Redd-Brandon 6-3 MB SR Spanish Fork, Utah Spanish Fork HS

11

Chelsey Schofield 6-1 OH JR Provo, Utah Mountain View HS

8

Alli Spurrier 6-3 RS JR Salt Lake City, Utah Olympus HS

4

Tess Sutton 5-3 L FR Bonsall, Calif. Fallbrook HS

14

Jaydra Thurber 6-1 OH FR Temecula, Calif. Chaparral HS

1

Carly Trueman 6-1 MB/OH FR Tucson, Ariz. Tucson High Magnet School

 

 

What’s in a Name (or Accent?)

The University of Utah athletic teams are known as the “Utes.” According to Wikipedia (we are lazy researchers):

The Utes are an indigenous people of the Great Basin, now living primarily in Utah and Colorado. There are three Ute tribal reservations: Uintah-Ouray in northeastern Utah (3,500 members); Southern Ute in Colorado (1,500 members); and Ute Mountain which primarily lies in Colorado.

There is an ongoing debate within the University of Utah community whether the University should continue to use the name Utes in connection with its sports teams.  We are agnostics on this question, and note only that there are ongoing negotiations between Ute tribal leaders and University of Utah officials regarding Utah’s future use of the Ute name.

All of which is prologue for the following clip from the movie “My Cousin Vinnie,” which has nothing to do with the University of Utah, the Ute tribe, or volleyball — and everything to do with accents and the irresistible bravado of Joe Pesci’s character in this movie.  This is one of our all-time favorite movie scenes, and we have always hoped for the opportunity to use it in a match write-up.  So here it is: