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2021 Texas Volleyball


TexasDPT

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40 minutes ago, Gardner Barnes said:

I wish you and her the best and I certainly understand what you are saying. I am posting this only because I see the same naïveté here that we had when my daughter was playing 14s.

VB recruiting an undersized player is tough. It requires more outbound work than you will ever possibly imagine because she will be overlooked both at tounaments and on the lists that are curated but a group of coaches with a desire to promote thier own kids. Because she is a 26 it may be even harder. Covid year will result in a shitload of openings for 24 and 25s. A lot of teams will have a lot of young players when the 26s come around.

College coaches do NOT come find you if you are outside the prep 150. You have to go find them. She will have to outbound contact via Email and Twitter literally every week.

Trust me on this. We have been though it for the last 3 years with my 6’0 ‘22 and are about to start the process again with my 15s. If it wasn’t for the club we are on there is no way we get the press and lists activity we do. Although my 15 is 6’1” so it should be a bit eaiser for her.

As you may or may not know, there is a cabal of 20 or so clubs in the us that run shit. You mentioned two of them above. That makes it flat out harder for girls that don’t play for this clubs.

I could go in for another 10000 words…. But I won’t.

I’ll leave you with this - just make sure you both are comfortable with the range of commitment locationsgoing back 5 years or so of whatever club you choose for 16s.

  I am not as naive to recruiting as you might think. I mentioned those two clubs for a reason. I know who they are and the pull they have. That said, we ARE NOT going to play for either of those organizations, so there is no point worrying about the parts we cannot control. Instead, we will focus on what we can control. Although she doesn't use it all the time, at the beginning of club season she touched 9'4 and now she has touched 9'6. We hope to get her close to 10ft over the next 4 years. We are not delusional. We have a kid who will be two to three inches below solid pin hitter height, but is an above average leaper, with above average arm talent according to a mph chart. All we can do is hone her vball skills and send out video.

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I wish you and her the best and I certainly understand what you are saying. I am posting this only because I see the same naïveté here that we had when my daughter was playing 14s.

VB recruiting an undersized player is tough. It requires more outbound work than you will ever possibly imagine because she will be overlooked both at tounaments and on the lists that are curated but a group of coaches with a desire to promote thier own kids. Because she is a 26 it may be even harder. Covid year will result in a shitload of openings for 24 and 25s. A lot of teams will have a lot of young players when the 26s come around.

College coaches do NOT come find you if you are outside the prep 150. You have to go find them. She will have to outbound contact via Email and Twitter literally every week.

Trust me on this. We have been though it for the last 3 years with my 6’0 ‘22 and are about to start the process again with my 15s. If it wasn’t for the club we are on there is no way we get the press and lists activity we do. Although my 15 is 6’1” so it should be a bit eaiser for her.

As you may or may not know, there is a cabal of 20 or so clubs in the us that run shit. You mentioned two of them above. That makes it flat out harder for girls that don’t play for this clubs.

I could go in for another 10000 words…. But I won’t.

I’ll leave you with this - just make sure you both are comfortable with the range of commitment locationsgoing back 5 years or so of whatever club you choose for 16s.

I’m also in the club scene and mine is 16. We won lone star regionals last year in 15 open playing for a no name club beating Houston Skyline Royal and Alamo Premier back to back in the semis and finals. We played at Nationals in the National Division which is second highest. We had college coaches all over our courts including Rice, Aggie, Baylor and many schools from all over. Very cool experience.

My daughter is a 5’9-5’10 setter..if she was 6ft she would be a big time recruit but I still think she will get an opportunity. We will see.

What club are you gardener barnes?

That guy you mentioned y’all were ranked higher than HJV? Hopefully you aren’t looking at AES rankings, those are worthless . You need to look at the lone star region rankings which shows stellar 14 if you are on 14 elite. This is what they use to seed tournaments.


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9 minutes ago, TexasDPT said:

Wow! What a get! We are looking good for next season!

Added an elite libero and a 6 rotation player who was an AA HM as a freshman and the #2 recruit in her class 

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7 minutes ago, texasstrong12 said:

The offseason couldn't be going much better. Now hit on this assistant coach hire. 

Maybe Elliott  is finally getting serious about defense/ball control. Skinner isn't Fields offensively but she's a better all around player defensively isn't she?

Yeah she plays all 6 rotations at the college level already 

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4 minutes ago, texasstrong12 said:

The offseason couldn't be going much better. Now hit on this assistant coach hire. 

Maybe Elliott  is finally getting serious about defense/ball control. Skinner isn't Fields offensively but she's a better all around player defensively isn't she?

Yes, Skinner is the better 6 rotation player at the moment…she can pass and play defense in the back row. She was playing all the way around at Kentucky this past season until she was injured with a concussion. 

She may not be a potent offensive player like Skylar is, but she will get there. She has hops and players definitely develop offensively at Texas. She shredded our defense in the Championship against Kentucky.

Now if Elliott can bring in a Jamie Morrison-type assistant, I’ll be thoroughly impressed!

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3 minutes ago, TexasDPT said:

Yes, Skinner is the better 6 rotation player at the moment…she can pass and play defense in the back row. She was playing all the way around at Kentucky this past season until she was injured with a concussion. 

She may not be a potent offensive player like Skylar is, but she will get there. She has hops and players definitely develop offensively at Texas. She shredded our defense in the Championship against Kentucky.

Now if Elliott can bring in a Jamie Morrison-type assistant, I’ll be thoroughly impressed!

Fleck means she won’t have to hit OOS as much. Probably a nice selling point. 

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28 minutes ago, Js1 said:

Unless we get Hord:

L1: Skinner
L2: Eggleston
M1: O’Neal
M2: Phillips
Opp: Devin (DS Iosia)
S: SKT
L: Fleck

I think Elliott is gonna want Parra’s serve in the line-up. She was like top 5 in the country in aces if I’m not mistaken. 

Another possible line-up could be playing Skinner as a passing Opposite so she can run the D-ball and have Devin on the left-pin for a bigger block and have Parra DS for her….
 

Or maybe have Mel and Logan on the left and Skinner at Opposite with all of them playing 6 rotations…they would run a true international 5-1.

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8 minutes ago, Js1 said:

VT rumor that the new assistant was on the USANT in Tokyo.  Not Adams or Hooker or Ogbogu. Jordan Larson or Kim Hill???

Larson would piss off so many Nebraska fans and that would be a good hire too. 

I'm not sure it addresses the passing issues though. 

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50 minutes ago, texasstrong12 said:

Larson would piss off so many Nebraska fans and that would be a good hire too. 

I'm not sure it addresses the passing issues though. 

Larson’s husband is head coach at Pepperdine so not sure if the move to Texas would make sense for either of them. 
Kim Hill would be an interesting choice…she started off as a MB then Opp in college and then transitioned into one of the best passing OHs in the world. 
Foluke Akinradewo would continue the tradition of having a woman of color on staff for a team that traditionally has a high number of African-American athletes.

Justine Wong-Orantes would also be great to have on staff as she would improve passing and floor defense. She already has her gold medal and may have accomplished everything she set out for professionally. There were rumors she delayed playing overseas because she didn’t like that lifestyle but had to do it in order to develop her skills to the next level. But having either Larson or JWO would irritate the fuck out of Nebraska fans.

Jerritt is killing it right now with getting Fleck and Skinner on board and now a recent Olympic player as a AC. He’s giving a middle finger to all his critics (including myself)…and I’m loving it!

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4 minutes ago, Js1 said:

I’m glad my job isn’t to juggle rosters with transfers and HS kids 

True and we just have to reset how we evaluate rosters these days. Players like Fields (volleyball), Tyson (men's basketball) and Hunter (women's basketball) are going to transfer. It's not really an indictment of the program it's just a reality of the transfer portal era. 

In the long-term, the transfer portal is going to help us more than it hurts us because we are one of the few schools that can hand pick who we want. 

 

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On 1/8/2022 at 8:04 PM, Steven Avery said:


I’m also in the club scene and mine is 16. We won lone star regionals last year in 15 open playing for a no name club beating Houston Skyline Royal and Alamo Premier back to back in the semis and finals. We played at Nationals in the National Division which is second highest. We had college coaches all over our courts including Rice, Aggie, Baylor and many schools from all over. Very cool experience.

My daughter is a 5’9-5’10 setter..if she was 6ft she would be a big time recruit but I still think she will get an opportunity. We will see.

What club are you gardener barnes?

That guy you mentioned y’all were ranked higher than HJV? Hopefully you aren’t looking at AES rankings, those are worthless . You need to look at the lone star region rankings which shows stellar 14 if you are on 14 elite. This is what they use to seed tournaments.


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  I did not say we were ranked higher than HJV. I said we beat HJV. The rankings I was talking about were the overall club rankings dating back the last 5 years. The conversation was Barnes telling me that we should consider a more visible club than Stellar. Bottom line, picking a club is hard. There are so many things to juggle. Is she getting playing time? Are they playing her the right position? Are they developing her? Is the distance to the club feasible for your family schedule? Is her age group for that particular club competitive? Last year she played for that number 8 AVA Adidas team, All the same girls. We left AVA because that particular age group, for whatever reason, has been short middles over the last two years. So they kept trying to push her to play middle because of her athletic ability. However, she will never be tall enough to play the position. AVA does not care. They cared about winning. We tried out for 3 clubs and she made the top team for all 3. We chose the best fit for us.

  As far as those lonestar rankings go it is all just guess work this early in the season. We played HJV once and beat them. We also beat SA Juniors 14 Adidas twice. This particular squad is a gold bracket squad. They just need to go to bed and wake up with the same fire on day two. They seem to have a lot of unforced errors early morning day two. We started the year number 5 on LS rankings. We dropped to 14 after the FAST warmup and 210. In both of those tourneys we lost in the semis. HJV, after losing to us in pool play, back-doored their way to gold in their own FAST tourney.

  If you are in the Houston area I would recommend some setting lessons with coach Marco Meoni at AVA. He was a 6'7 two time Olympian setter with the Italian team who won silver and bronze. He is an amazing setter and coach. Kids come from hours away to work with him.

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8 hours ago, TexasDPT said:

Larson’s husband is head coach at Pepperdine so not sure if the move to Texas would make sense for either of them. 
Kim Hill would be an interesting choice…she started off as a MB then Opp in college and then transitioned into one of the best passing OHs in the world. 
Foluke Akinradewo would continue the tradition of having a woman of color on staff for a team that traditionally has a high number of African-American athletes.

Justine Wong-Orantes would also be great to have on staff as she would improve passing and floor defense. She already has her gold medal and may have accomplished everything she set out for professionally. There were rumors she delayed playing overseas because she didn’t like that lifestyle but had to do it in order to develop her skills to the next level. But having either Larson or JWO would irritate the fuck out of Nebraska fans.

Jerritt is killing it right now with getting Fleck and Skinner on board and now a recent Olympic player as a AC. He’s giving a middle finger to all his critics (including myself)…and I’m loving it!

Not that I’m saying he will Or we will but if we get Hord with all the other moves. JE really is going to try to get Logan her title before she graduates 

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Hord, Fleck, and Skinner would be unreal. 

Texas would have an All-American caliber player at almost every position. There would also be a ton of pressure to win it all next season but I guess that's no different than most years. But lord, that roster would really be a "super team" as some on volleytalk described it. 

 

 

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4 minutes ago, texasstrong12 said:

Hord, Fleck, and Skinner would be unreal. 

Texas would have an All-American caliber player at almost every position. There would also be a ton of pressure to win it all next season but I guess that's no different than most years. But lord, that roster would really be a "super team" as some on volleytalk described it. 

 

 

It’s my hunch we are not getting Hord. She’ll go to Corn or Pitt. I’d watch Parra’s follows - she’s not connected enough in the club scene to follow these transfers unless it’s happening. She followed Skinner shortly before she posted her insta announcement 

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15 minutes ago, texasstrong12 said:

I agree it seems unlikely but the roster is so loaded now that I wonder if it impacts the decision of somebody like Hord chasing a title. 

Also, Phillips would likely transfer if Texas adds Hord don't you think? 

 

 

 

 

Phillips has 2 more seasons and Hord is a one year rental.  I'm not sure on O'Neal, 2022 is her RS SR season.  If she doesn't come back in 2023, Phillips would slide back into the middle alongside Singletary.  Otherwise, in 2023, we are very young - our middles would be a FR and SO, along with a FR setter if we don't pick up a transfer. 

Phillips is one of my faves because she's a lot like Yazzie - she'll play where asked.  Devin is going to have freshman struggles at times and if Hord or O'Neal get hurt or have a bad night, she can slide into any of those spots. 

Keeping Phillips is very important. 

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5 minutes ago, texasstrong12 said:

Definitely seems like Penn State settled after missing on a couple coaches. Thought they would be able to land a big name. 

 

Unfortunately, following Russ Rose is a hard ass job.  Following the legend always leads to some level of disappointment.  (See: Conrad -> Goestenkors; Summitt -> Holly Warlick; Mulkey -> Collen).  Just like Texas WBB after Jody, it's a matter of "is it the coach or the program?"  because PSU has 3 seasons of their whole history that aren't Russ Rose and they were EAIAW years.  We will be asking the same question about UConn WBB after Geno is gone. 

Schmacher-Cawley had 4 years at Penn St. as top assistant and recruiting coordinator and previous HC experience as UIC (9 years and 113 wins) and is a PSU grad who played on the 1999 title team, the first of Rose's 7 titles.  It's not the flashy hire, but she has HC experience and has been part of the staff. 

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1 minute ago, texasstrong12 said:

Are both Pressley and Skinner out of eligibility at Baylor? 

Yes.  Pressley played 2017-2021 (5 seasons) at Baylor.  Avery Skinner played 2017-2020 at Kentucky (4 seasons) and 2021 at Baylor (5th season). 

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The Big 12 is going to be a cakewalk next season. 

At least Baylor got their shit together for a couple seasons but there will be a huge drop off with both those players gone. I don't know what the solution is other than scheduling a tough non-conference schedule but that's normally early in the season. 

 

 

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1 minute ago, texasstrong12 said:

The Big 12 is going to be a cakewalk next season. 

At least Baylor got their shit together for a couple seasons but there will be a huge drop off with both those players gone. I don't know what the solution is other than scheduling a tough non-conference schedule but that's normally early in the season. 

 

 

We also only have road matches in FW (yawn), Morgantown (an improving WV squad), Norman and Manhattan.  We host Baylor, ISU, Tech and Kansas. 

Go load up in the non-conf - it appears, after taking 2020 off from big non-conf matches, that we have completed our home and home with Minnesota and Stanford (we hosted Minny in 2019 and traveled in 2021; traveled to Stanford in 2019 and hosted in 2021). 

We owe USC a trip out west, as we hosted them in 2019.  Dunno if we owe USD a return trip after hosting them in 2021 - if so, 2 match trip in California would be great.  

I'm sure we will play A&M, Texas State and Rice. 

Schedule Florida, Ohio State and someone like Pittsburgh, Louisville or Georgia Tech.  Maybe BYU or Illinois. 

Elliot has almost always scheduled light - we played 29 matches in 2021 (even if we made the title game, we still would have only played 31), compared to teams like Wisconsin (34), Nebraska (34), Pittsburgh (34), Purdue (33), Georgia Tech (32), Ohio State (33), Illinois (34).  I know the Big 12 is light (only 16 conf matches) so we need to play as many non-conf as we can get.  If you assume we will play A&M, Texas State and Rice for in-state matchups,  we need at least 7-8 big name matchups (USC, USD, one of the better SEC programs like UF, a B1G team or two, an ACC team, BYU). 

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I really think the Gabriel setting era is over at Texas - 

Skinner, Eggleston, Parra and Devin K. require a setter who can and will set that backrow attack, whether its the pipe, the BIC or D.  Jhenna just doesn't set this.  

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19 minutes ago, Js1 said:

I really think the Gabriel setting era is over at Texas - 

Skinner, Eggleston, Parra and Devin K. require a setter who can and will set that backrow attack, whether its the pipe, the BIC or D.  Jhenna just doesn't set this.  

I really hope so...the past 4 years have shown you can't win with Gabriel in the front row.

2018 - BYU's Roni Jones-Perry constantly goes over her block and the back row can't pick up any of her shots

2019 - Don't remember the Louisville match...just that the whole team played like crap

2020 - Kentucky's Stumler shreds Gabriel's block over and over again

2021- Backrow and serve-receive were atrocious and Nebraska's Batenhorst abused her block every chance she had

She's a good setter and can make our hitters look great against mediocre teams but it's quite different going up against elite teams. If Jerritt has her starting again next season, he's an idiot.  He has four years of data to know she isn't going to win the big one for Texas...

Edited by TexasDPT
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1 minute ago, TexasDPT said:

I really hope so...the past 4 years have shown you can't win with Gabriel in the front row.

2018 - BYU's Roni Jones-Perry constantly goes over her block and the back row can't pick up any of her shots

2019 - Don't remember the Louisville match...just that the whole team played like crap

2020 - Kentucky's Stumler shreds Gabriel's block over and over again

2021- Nebraska's Batenhorst abused her block every chance she had

She's a good setter and can make our hitters look great against mediocre teams but it's quite different going up against elite teams. If Jerritt has her starting again next season, he's an idiot.  He has four years of data to know she isn't going to win the big one for Texas...

She's a gamer and whatnot, which is great, but she's still a 5'8  blocking liability and somehow had some pretty bad chemistry with hitters she's been setting for since she took over the job.  Some of her sets to Butler were ugly. 

SKT was getting more rhythm and chemistry with the hitters, she's a better block and that was with no offseason to train with the team. 

She also had 17 kills in 58 sets versus Jhenna's 19 in 98 sets.  Gabriel's serving was also pretty bad - 47 errors and only 22 aces.  If you're going to have high errors, you better have high aces (Parra: 60/85; O'Neal 31/36; Iosia 29/49 and Logan 44/46).  

SKT was also credited with 1 solo block and 20 block assists in 58 sets.  Jhenna - 0 and 25 in 98 sets. 

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16 minutes ago, Js1 said:

She's a gamer and whatnot, which is great, but she's still a 5'8  blocking liability and somehow had some pretty bad chemistry with hitters she's been setting for since she took over the job.  Some of her sets to Butler were ugly. 

SKT was getting more rhythm and chemistry with the hitters, she's a better block and that was with no offseason to train with the team. 

She also had 17 kills in 58 sets versus Jhenna's 19 in 98 sets.  Gabriel's serving was also pretty bad - 47 errors and only 22 aces.  If you're going to have high errors, you better have high aces (Parra: 60/85; O'Neal 31/36; Iosia 29/49 and Logan 44/46).  

SKT was also credited with 1 solo block and 20 block assists in 58 sets.  Jhenna - 0 and 25 in 98 sets. 

Such a big disparity with the stats...I think it just shows it's time for a change at setter.

And btw, Jhenna admitted she's only 5'6 in an interview with Out of System...

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17 hours ago, TexasDPT said:

Larson’s husband is head coach at Pepperdine so not sure if the move to Texas would make sense for either of them. 
Kim Hill would be an interesting choice…she started off as a MB then Opp in college and then transitioned into one of the best passing OHs in the world. 
Foluke Akinradewo would continue the tradition of having a woman of color on staff for a team that traditionally has a high number of African-American athletes.

Justine Wong-Orantes would also be great to have on staff as she would improve passing and floor defense. She already has her gold medal and may have accomplished everything she set out for professionally. There were rumors she delayed playing overseas because she didn’t like that lifestyle but had to do it in order to develop her skills to the next level. But having either Larson or JWO would irritate the fuck out of Nebraska fans.

Jerritt is killing it right now with getting Fleck and Skinner on board and now a recent Olympic player as a AC. He’s giving a middle finger to all his critics (including myself)…and I’m loving it!

VT saying it’s not a player. Erin Virtue maybe? Former setter at Illinois, has experience as a recruiting coordinator when she was coaching college in the B1G and at Cincinnati. 

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On 1/6/2022 at 3:06 PM, Js1 said:

Also Salima was just named the head coach at ND.  Wow! 

Salima was also the boys program director at Auistin Juniors. AJV's loss is Salima's gain. We will miss her very positive presence & always smiling face. Congrasts, Salima!

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18 minutes ago, texasstrong12 said:

The national championship site is in Omaha next year? How many times do these fuckers get to host the final 4? 

Am I mistaken because it feels like they've hosted a few times already in recent memory. 

 

 

Bc it’s guaranteed butts in seats 

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Devin K. - Gatorade POY in Hawaii
Ella Swindle - Gatorade POY in Missouri (as a junior)
Jordyn Byrd  - Gatorade POY in Florida (as a junior)
Marianna Singletary - Gatorade POY in South Carolina

Averi Carlson (setter) won Texas Gatorade POY (2022 commit to Baylor) 

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Basically the entire Ohio State roster started following Hord.  At least she didn't go to Nebraska! 

Molly moves to middle and then it's how do you fit together Skinner, Parra, Eggleston and Devin K. on the pins.  I wonder if Elliot can convince Parra to be a DS again for Devin, give her a year to acclimate to the college game (and passing) and then let Parra loose next year playing 6 rotations after Logan graduates. 

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I think Molly is going to surprise a lot of people next season...She has a quick arm swing and can move the ball around because she sees the court well. The problem she had playing Opposite is that she isn't a terminal hitter with a well-formed double block on her. She may not have the lateral movement Butler had, but she can still put up a formidable block in the middle. 

 

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