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Volleyball vs #19 Arizona State

If the Buffs lose this, it would have to be one of the worst collapses they've had.
 
Great win for the Buffs!!! They almost blew it, but were able to hold onto the win against a very good team.
:gobuffs:
 
Per announcers, 1st time they've beaten two ranked teams in a weekend since 2005. Awesome weekend. Guess they wanted to get their 5 set record up to .500.

(If they can somehow win one or maybe two next weekend at home against the LA schools, I can probably switch my other thread from looking at their chances into making the tournament, and instead start looking at their chances of being one of the 16 top seeds who might get to host the 1st weekend of the tournament. That's probably going to be hard for them to get- but I can at least start looking.)
 
First, I need to apologize to the coach and this team for doubting them earlier this season. Way to go Buffs! Impressive weekend beatings two ranked teams! I really enjoy watching this team. My frustration earlier this season was due to having such high expectations. Glad to see the Buffs are coming on strong in the Pac 12 season!

looking at the standings and results from today, we are tied for 3rd place at 7-5 with UCLA, Oregon, and Arizona.

we now have 4 straight home games including ranked USC, UCLA, and Washington. I'm believing in our buffs that they will win all 4. Would he a huge win to best Washington this season.

We we also get Oregon State at home, which we can win, as well as Cal on the road. Likely loss on the road at Stanford. Could steal a win with Utah on the road to end the season.

With tho that, we could finish the rest of the season 7-1 and end up 14-6 in the pac. Maybe I'm thinking too big but the Buffs and our coaching staff have given us some hope for a great end to the 2014 season!

Aztec, you write such great stuff about the team. With your expertise, what do you predict?? :)

AztecBuff said:
Per announcers, 1st time they've beaten two ranked teams in a weekend since 2005.
Awesome weekend. Guess they wanted to get their 5 set record up to .500.

(If they can somehow win one or maybe two next weekend at home against the LA schools, I can probably switch my other thread from looking at their chances into making the tournament, and instead start looking at their chances of being one of the 16 top seeds who might get to host the 1st weekend of the tournament. That's probably going to be hard for them to get- but I can at least start looking.)
Click to expand...
 
sliderNcider said:
So what do our tourney chances look like?
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.500 the rest of the way and the Buffs should be a stone cold lock.

It's now getting to that point where I'm thinking about the possibility of the team being totally healthy and peaking when they hit the NCAAs. Could go on a big run.
 
Nice to see Edelman rounding back to form. Getting some really strong contributions from our young MBs and Ortiz is finding her spaces. Team looks real good. Could make a nice run in the tourney

From phone
 
90sBuff said:
First, I need to apologize to the coach and this team for doubting them earlier this season. Way to go Buffs! Impressive weekend beatings two ranked teams! I really enjoy watching this team. My frustration earlier this season was due to having such high expectations. Glad to see the Buffs are coming on strong in the Pac 12 season!

looking at the standings and results from today, we are tied for 3rd place at 7-5 with UCLA, Oregon, and Arizona.

we now have 4 straight home games including ranked USC, UCLA, and Washington. I'm believing in our buffs that they will win all 4. Would he a huge win to best Washington this season.

We we also get Oregon State at home, which we can win, as well as Cal on the road. Likely loss on the road at Stanford. Could steal a win with Utah on the road to end the season.

With tho that, we could finish the rest of the season 7-1 and end up 14-6 in the pac. Maybe I'm thinking too big but the Buffs and our coaching staff have given us some hope for a great end to the 2014 season!

Aztec, you write such great stuff about the team. With your expertise, what do you predict?? :)
Click to expand...

Well, still having to play two of the three (Stanford, Washington and FSU) remaining undefeated teams in the nation one more time, along with two other ranked teams, a 7-1 record is probably a BEST case scenario. But, at least the Buffs have shown they can play with the best the conference has. Conversely, ANY of the remaining matches could also be losses if they don't keep improving and concentrated. (One conference win team WSU was ahead 2 sets to 1 today, and then 9-4 in set 5, AT UCLA before falling 15-13 in the 5th.)

It is great that 5 of the remaining 8 are home matches. Especially, USC and Washington's serves killed the Buffs in their road matches, so hopefully in Boulder, as the announcers have mentioned in the past, they both will have serve issues, or at least their big guns (Bricio for USC and Strickland for WA) will need to slow their tough jump serves down some to get them in, and so won't give their teams so many easy points on serve.

Of course, what's great as a fan is the Buffs have played tough with every team other than USC this year, and, as mentioned above, get them at home. (USC has also been very inconsistent, although they are looking better now as two of their main players get healthier.) As with most (all?) sports, it's going to be how much the Buffs improve the rest of the year, compared to their opponents, that will determine how the season ends up. Looking at it, the Buffs DO have a lot of potential for improvement late in the year, especially with their middles, one of their setters, and their back row defensive players all being young and inexperienced.
(Must say I've been very impressed with G. Simpson. As I think of what they've asking her as a freshman to do, it's pretty amazing. As a full-time setter through high school, she probably hasn't had NEARLY the experience/ practice repetitions that other freshmen have had in two of the major skill areas she's now being asked to do- hitting and serve receive, in the best conference in the country. Since she has all the physical tools, I anticipate the "light will go on for her" hitting-wise some time, whether it be this year or during this off season, and then the Buffs will be REALLY scary. And, with her versatility, she'll probably end up one of the best all-time Buffs as long as she keeps developing. And, in the mean time, as well as helping the block, she's still helping set the Buffs to it's best kill % in I'd guess a decade or more. (Their kill % is .050 higher (.252 vs. .202) in conference to date this year compared to last.).

One last thing I'd say- if they did by some chance manage a 7-1 finish, I'd say they probably WOULD be one of the top 16 seeds, so the 1st couple NCAA tournament matches (assuming they won the 1st one of course) would probably be home at Coors.
 
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Two great wins this weekend. Edelman and Gabby about equal in setting and Taylor and Ortiz Ruiz about equal in kills. This team can play with anybody if they decide to.

I've heard announcers say that the early season losses got the freshman ready for these matches. These matches are what will get them in the NCAA tourney.

Team should be ranked after this weekend.
 
buffgal said:
Two great wins this weekend. Edelman and Gabby about equal in setting and Taylor and Ortiz Ruiz about equal in kills. This team can play with anybody if they decide to.

I've heard announcers say that the early season losses got the freshman ready for these matches. These matches are what will get them in the NCAA tourney.

Team should be ranked after this weekend.
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Yeah- I've been having fun guessing WHERE the Buffs might be ranked tomorrow (not that weekly rankings mean much).

Thanks to a poster named "future" on the volleytalk board for listing how the Top 25 did this week, both #'s 21 (Duke) and 23 (Texas A&M) lost to unranked teams this week, so I'd assume the Buffs at minimum get to #24 (assuming the coaches who vote aren't sleeping in due to the time change and miss this weekend's results). The Arizona schools who the Buffs beat were pretty high at #'s 15 and 19, so may be tough to catch?
 
Wanted to add one other thing (since I believe records should always be cherished and recognized), here's a quote from the cubuffs article reporting the match (I bolded the one sentence)-

"
The Buffs posted 24.0 team blocks, a season-best. CU had 15 block solos in the match, breaking a school record for the most solo blocks in a five-set match. The previous record of 14 was set in 1990 against Texas.


Freshman Anna Pfefferle recorded nine blocks, three solo and six assists. (Taylor) Simpson also had a strong presence at the net with seven total blocks (six solo and one assist). Ortiz Ruiz and junior Alexis Austin each posted six blocks. Both had two solos and four assists. Sophomore Katelyn Cuff got in on the action with four blocks (one solo and three assists) and freshman Gabby Simpson added one block solo.
"

Especially impressive with 1/2 of the names mentioned above being 2 freshmen and one lightly used (last year) sophomore. Congrats Buffs!
 
Commentator on today's broadcast mentioned how tough of an adjustment it has been for CU coming from the mwc.

From phone
 
SD Buff said:
Commentator on today's broadcast mentioned how tough of an adjustment it has been for CU coming from the mwc.

From phone
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Did they really say that!? OY! Utah came from the MWC and CU, obviously, from the Big 12.
 
A couple more short facts regarding this weekend (quoted from a Daily Camera article that can be read in full at http://www.dailycamera.com/cu-colle...leyball-buffs-upset-no-19-asu-road?source=rss ):

1) "This marks just the fourth time in the 29-year history of the program that CU has won back-to-back games against ranked teams in any venue (also in 1993, 1996 and 2005). They had never defeated top 20 teams in consecutive games before this weekend."

2) "CU is 3-1 in its last four road matches against ranked teams. Prior to that, the Buffs had lost 45 consecutive matches away from Boulder against ranked opponents, dating back to 2005."
 
I would love to play CSU in the NCAA Tourney. Any chance it could happen?? What do you all think?

i looked at their schedule. It looks like the Rams played just 2 top 25 teams this whole year. Our schedule, on the other hand had like 14-15 games against ranked opponents. I know CSu is well coached but they are highly over-rated and quite honestly, I'd take Taylor, Gabby and Cierra over any of their players. Doubt they could handle our Buffs as they haven't really played anyone good, except to beat Arizona state 3-2 and lose 0-3 to Wisconsin.

CSu has been the best team in Colorado for a while. But no more and never again.
 
90sBuff said:
I would love to play CSU in the NCAA Tourney. Any chance it could happen?? What do you all think?

i looked at their schedule. It looks like the Rams played just 2 top 25 teams this whole year. Our schedule, on the other hand had like 14-15 games against ranked opponents. I know CSu is well coached but they are highly over-rated and quite honestly, I'd take Taylor, Gabby and Cierra over any of their players. Doubt they could handle our Buffs as they haven't really played anyone good, except to beat Arizona state 3-2 and lose 0-3 to Wisconsin.

CSu has been the best team in Colorado for a while. But no more and never again.
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Actually, there's a very good chance of the two meeting (assuming both the Buffs and CSU keep winning and make the tournament), as the NCAA is VERY conscious of minimizing travel costs in the 1st rounds of tournament play. (Note- all of this is totally off things I've read on the volleytalk blog I read, so can't vouch for its accuracy.)

The main requirement for them to play each other is that either the Buffs or (more likely) CSU must be awarded one of the top 16 (seeded) positions come tournament selection time. Assuming that occurs, I believe the seeded teams always get the 1st two rounds in their gym, and the odds are strong the local unseeded team (either CU or CSU) will be sent to the local seeded team’s gym. They might not play each other in round one, however, depending on what other two teams got sent to Colorado, but if both won round one they’d definitely meet in round two a day later.

If neither team ends up seeded (which is what happened last year), then both will need to travel, and they probably wouldn’t meet.

For most of the year, it’s been assumed CSU, ranked #7 in the country this week (and with a high #14 RPI), WAS a pretty safe seed, especially with the Mountain West not having any other ranked teams, so it was thought they’d probably win their remaining matches. However, they lost to UNLV this weekend, and I don’t know how big of an effect that might have on their chances at receiving a seed. (Unlike last year, when one loss TOTAL was enough for them to lose their seed due to their relatively weak schedule, they have had a couple quality non-conference wins this year (especially road wins against current #11 BYU and, as you mentioned, ASU) so they might be able to still get a seed with the UNLV loss.)

Of course, the best scenario is for the Buffs to win A LOT if not all of its remaining matches to get seeded themselves (which I assume would need to include what would be considered by the committee a BIG upset over Stanford and/ or Washington). Then, the Rams might/ would need to come to Coors.

As to CU’s chances against CSU, I haven’t seen them play, but they are obviously a good club. Looking historically, (not that it matters much to today’s teams), CU is only 11-22 lifetime, are riding a 6 game losing streak, and haven’t beaten CSU since 2002 (but also haven’t played them since 2010). I would be curious to see, as you also say, how much the fact CU plays such tougher competition during conference might make them more “battle hardened”, and so give them an edge in a match. Conversely, if the match is at CSU/ Moby Arena, they have a great home team environment there, so that would give them that edge.

By the way, I would love it if this became an annual non-conference game, with the home teams rotating. (In the volleyball forum I visit, a couple of (I assume) CSU fans were saying early in the year CSU (coach?) might not schedule CU because CSU’s pissed at CU for “stealing” G. Simpson (who was verbally committed to them for awhile). However, they were hopefully/ probably just sour lammie fans with no inside info. (I’ve never understood how or why some fans get upset at young people who change their minds regarding a college commitment decision which, especially in most of the “Olympic” sports, is often made when they’re 16 or younger. People- That’s why they’re VERBAL non-binding commitments at that point.))
 
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AztecBuff said:
Actually, there's a very good chance of the two meeting (assuming both the Buffs and CSU keep winning and make the tournament), as the NCAA is VERY conscious of minimizing travel costs in the 1st rounds of tournament play. (Note- all of this is totally off things I've read on the volleytalk blog I read, so can't vouch for its accuracy.)
Click to expand...

My alma mater, the University of San Diego regionals in recent years for comparison sake:

2013: Host Arizona, UCSB, New Mexico St
2012:mad: UCLA
2011:mad: UCLA
2010:mad: USC
2009: Missed Tournament
2008:mad:USC
2007:mad: Wisconsin
2006:mad: Tennessee
2005:mad: UCLA

If I remember correctly, they were the ranked team @ Tennessee in 2006 though, for some reason ($$$) a hosting bid wasn't put in. That screwed that year up. Travel is a major factor in regional placement.
 
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