GAME DAY
LONE STAR SHOWDOWN
6:30 pm
Reed Arena
TEXAS A&M FIGHTIN AGGIES (9-1) vs #8 tu (5-3)
Tonight! 6:30! Reed Arena! Get there, tell your friends, tell your neighbors, tell your kids, tell your dogs, tell the cashier where you get lunch, tell everyone you know that they must be at Reed Arena tonight! Do you hate tu, do you love volleyball, are you interested in volleyball, do you love A&M, do you want to be a generous conference member and welcome tu to the SEC, or do you wanna be a rude conference member and welcome tu to a hostile environment and show them that in the sec it just means more… THEN GET TO REED ARENA!!!!!!
After a strong non conference series, your Aggie volleyball team is sitting at 9-1 with the one loss being to number 7 Wisconsin! This team is much deeper than last season and is spearheaded by a versatile attack with Maddie Waak driving the offense at setter and two brick walls in Ifenna Cos-Okpalla and Morgan Perkins up top!
This season unlike the last few, A&M is able to attack offensively in a variety of ways! We have 6'3 Logan Lednicky who is a first team all conference player at the opposite hitter position! She is our most lethal weapon with a heavy arm!! Our other two outside hitters are transfers 6'3 Emily Hellmuth and 6'3 Taylor Humphrey! Hellmuth brings hell with her powerful swings and Humphrey when on can really bring some fire as well! But, one thing Waak does well is set the middles as well! Cos-Okpalla and Perkins can be threats offensively too!! So the variety of threats really keeps our offense balanced and keeps defenses on their toes by giving us more one on one opportunities at the net!
But another reason for our great start is due to what Jamie Morrison refers to as THE LITTLES! Which is our much improved back row! Returning Ava Underwood, the Aggies went out and got two Libero/DS specialists in Ellee Stinson and Tatum Thomas! We have struggled in recent years on serve receive and attacking receive, but with our 3 littles rotating back there, we have improved in that area! The Libero position between the three is interchangeable and all will see action!
On the other side of the net obviously presents a very strong challenge in texas! They are the back to back national champions and once again are loaded with talent! Everything they do runs through All-American 6'2 Madisen Skinner who has one of the strongest arms, if not the strongest, in the country and averages nearly 4 kills a set!! We will need our middles and front row to step up and really challenge her! They really love to serve her and use her as a workhorse, but they have another strong hitter in 6'1 OH Jenna Wenaas and 6'0 Opposite Reagan Rutherford! In the middle they are led by 6'4 Marianna Singletary and 6'4 freshman Ayden Ames! If we keep attacking from various angles we can isolate them and weaken their block! At Libero they have one of the best in the nation in Emma Halter, who is strong defensively but also very lethal serving the ball! They will play with two setters and after losses this really sparks conversation on who's the better between their returning setter Ella Swindle or their transfer setter Avery Carlson!
They obviously are very talented, but they did lose to an unranked Miami team and got swept by Stanford and lost to Minnesota! They did beat Wisconsin 3-1 however! I think the key to winning tonight's game is the play of our middles! Stanford destroyed them with their strong block so if we wanna compete in this game, our block playing at a high level will be imperative!! They also really struggle serving but will earn some aces!! We really need to slow down Skinner if at all possible and keep them out of system!! Our back row will need to be sharp and have smooth first touches!
I also think the environment of Reed Arena will play a factor! Sure tu has played in hostile environments and sure almost every school hates them lol but they haven't played a school that hates them more than we do! Horns will be thrown in a downwards direction all throughout the raucous arena and hopefully we can rattle them!!! It'll be a tall task to take them down, but I feel something special will happen tonight!! Let's get Reed Rocking and shock the nation!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! This could be a defining win in the Morrison Era and really catapult our program in the right direction!!! Gig'em!