2019 Kansas State Volleyball

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Kid In the Hall
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Re: 2019 Kansas State Volleyball

Post by Kid In the Hall » August 14th, 2019, 9:34 pm

purogato wrote:
August 14th, 2019, 5:14 pm
Why do you say that Kid?
With respect to returnees... Setter Sarah Dixon was a top 30 national recruit and honorable mention All-American last year. Opp. Gloria Mutiri was the regional freshman of the year and an honorable mention All-American last year. OH Brooke Heyne is undersized, but a highly skilled player who was the Nebraska state player of the year in high school. MB Peyton Williams has all-league potential.

With respect to the freshmen... this class was ranked in the top 25 in the country (pretty rare for Suzie). DS Dru Kuck originally committed to Wisconsin (traditional power) and was one of the top players in Wisconsin. OH Anna Dixon was a top 50 national recruit and played with the USA Volleyball Junior National Team this summer. She's also significant in that Suzie hasn't recruited the KC-area club teams particularly well (most of the best players go elsewhere and there are a lot of them littered on the rosters of national powers such as Stanford, Nebraska, etc. Suzie really needs to get better in this area). Setter Teana Adams-Kaonohi was a top 150 national recruit. MB Kayley Holleywood was a top 250 national recruit.

So, top to bottom, possibly the most talented team Suzie's had since the early to mid 2000s when she was coaching McLaughlin's recruits.

But, also very young...

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Post by sfs20 » August 14th, 2019, 9:53 pm

Brooke Heyne was injured in the spring so hopefully she is healthy now. Brynn Carlson or Holly Bonde would probably be the backup to her.

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Post by cutshot » August 14th, 2019, 10:06 pm

My prediction is a 16-12 record. I have read that A. Dixon is pretty good at USA vball, it doesn't seem like she is ready for 6 rotation OH yet. I also don't have a good feel for the extra MB. KSU still needs to consistently play defense (other than block) and pass better to get more wins in the big12. They struggled with this last season and have for the last several. I would also predict Kuck starts at L. The last class to be highly ranked (#27) was 2014 class (Zumach/Eaken/Fairfield/Flattum/Holcomb/Vogel) . This was also the same season Sasson transferred to KSU so that ended up being a good total class.

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Post by purogato » August 15th, 2019, 9:43 am

So great to get the report from you, Kid, and also to hear the optimism. I had heard that this was a highly rated class. I wasn't too sure how quickly that talent could translate to the Big 12 level. I don't know a lot about volleyball, but from what I've seen of the club level, girls can come out of club very ready for the college level. I've actually watched club teams in Kansas City convinced they could compete in college.

Please keep posting updates of what you hear as practices roll on. I hope to see this team a few times this year and would love for it to be a better season than the past couple. From what I could tell, passing was our achilles heel, and there wasn't chemistry to pair with the talent on the past two teams.

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Post by Kid In the Hall » August 15th, 2019, 2:21 pm

purogato wrote:
August 15th, 2019, 9:43 am
So great to get the report from you, Kid, and also to hear the optimism. I had heard that this was a highly rated class. I wasn't too sure how quickly that talent could translate to the Big 12 level. I don't know a lot about volleyball, but from what I've seen of the club level, girls can come out of club very ready for the college level. I've actually watched club teams in Kansas City convinced they could compete in college.

Please keep posting updates of what you hear as practices roll on. I hope to see this team a few times this year and would love for it to be a better season than the past couple. From what I could tell, passing was our achilles heel, and there wasn't chemistry to pair with the talent on the past two teams.
I wouldn't say I'm optimistic - as Cutshot said, we're probably looking at a .500 record or slightly better barring a mini-miracle. At this point, I'm just about done with Suzie - she just hasn't been able to maintain (or build on) the momentum from the McLaughlin years aside from that 2003 Big 12 title (and she's had 15+ years to do it). In the 15 years since that title, Suzie's finished in the top 3 of the league twice (both third-place finishes). In that same time, she's finished in the bottom half of the league eight times. She's missed the NCAA tourney six times and finished eighth or worse in the league five times. Her teams play with an amazing lack of consistency - being able to hang with/beat Texas one match and then losing the next to one of the league's worst teams. Since Nebraska left, the Big 12 has really only had one consistently great team (Texas) with some occasional outliers (KU had a spurt, etc.). So, finishing in the top half of the Big 12 should be a minimum requirement.

She's currently riding a terrible two-year stretch (25-31 overall, 8-25 in Big 12) that looks better than it really is due to non-conference wins against inferior opponents. If I was Gene Taylor, this could/should be a make-or-break year for Suzie. And, if it's a "break" year, we should look at Dawn Cady Sullivan (K-State alum) who led historical doormat UNLV to 22 wins in her first season as the head coach last year (an improvement of +14 over the previous year).

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Post by cutshot » August 15th, 2019, 7:38 pm

I'm probably too optimistic with 16-12, but hoping the new kids pan out :(. if the team doesn't improve a lot and misses the NCAA tourney, then it is time for a change. We won 5 games in the big12 last year and just 3 in 2017. Not good. It just can't be acceptable. Sure we beat KU twice last year, but we stunk it up against them in prev. years. they have been killing us in recruiting as well. I certainly don't think we will compete with Stanford if they come knocking in KC for talent, but we gotta win some (more than we are) of the battles with the local schools. I'm also on the band wagon of pulling Dawn over if the time comes.

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Post by cutshot » August 24th, 2019, 11:03 pm

It looks like Heyne is out for the year due to injury based on the media day interview with Fritz? Did anyone go the exhibition game against mizzou?

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Post by oldcat59 » August 25th, 2019, 9:04 am

Brooke Heyne has decided her future is more important than risking more serious injury to her body. With sadness and many tears, she has retired from collegiate volleyball. We wish this sweet young lady success in her future life!

The Exhibition with Missouri was a good showing of what MIGHT BE.......... Yes, there is potential with some of these freshman players........ only time (and coaching) will tell. We found it interesting, many times in time-out huddles, Coach Jeff was the coach doing the instructing-advising!

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Post by sfs20 » August 25th, 2019, 2:18 pm

I think Carlson has improved, I think she could be just fine as long as she is consistent. Anna Dixon struggled but it's just an exhibition so we will see. Bonde came in for her later in the match. Really short at that position now that Heyne's out. Dru Kuck has a lot of potential as libero, I already saw a lot more promise in the back row compared to last year. OH is the biggest concern, I think Archibong and Vernon will be fine as MB2 with more experience.

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Post by cutshot » August 25th, 2019, 3:07 pm

we need at least non-setter than can play all the way around and pass well. That was probably Heyne, but now who?. If we start subbing to get there it will be problematic at the end of tight games.

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