NCAA volleyball news — EIU’s Larregui Lopez gets 25 kills — notes, stats, trivia and tidbits
Giovana Larregui Lopez of Eastern Illinois hits against the Southern Indiana block of Paris Browning, left, and Abby Bednar/EIU photo
Random thoughts as the NCAA Division I women’s volleyball conference season kicks into full gear on a Tuesday when unbeaten — unbeaten! — Cal plays host to No. 4 Stanford in the first of their final two Pac-12 matchups before both schools go to the ACC next year.
There are 16 other matches on the Tuesday schedule, including four in the Horizon League. Defending-champion Wright State (4-7) is at Robert Morris (3-8), Cleveland State (6-5) plays IUPUI (6-5), Northern Kentucky (5-6) plays Youngstown State (5-6) and Oakland (6-6) plays Purdue Fort Wayne (5-7).
No. 18 Baylor of the Big 12 plays the WAC’s Stephen F. Austin. The ACC’s Florida State plays North Florida of the ASUN, there’s a battle in D.C. when American plays Howard and the two Nashville teams face off when Belmont plays Lipscomb.
Want to watch? We have the conference-by-conference schedule with viewing links for any match that is being shown in our VolleyballMag.com TV & Streaming Listings.
In the only match Monday, Giovana Larregui Lopez had 25 kills as Eastern Illinois (11-1) beat visiting Southern Indiana (4-8) in the Ohio Valley Conference opener for both teams.
Larregui Lopez, a 5-foot-9 senior outside from Puerto Rico, had three errors in 47 attacks to hit .468 and had two assists, two aces, 13 digs and four blocks, one solo. She is one of two players from The Rock School in Puerto Rico. The other is Jacksonville senior libero Kariana Ayala-Drew.
Natalie Mitchem had 18 kills and four blocks and Christina Martinez Mundo had 23 digsd, seven assists and four of her team’s 10 aces. Leah Anderson of Southern Indiana had 16 kills and Abby Bednar had 15.
Six unbeatens
Top-ranked Wisconsin and No. 2 Nebraska are both 9-0. Their respective pre-conference seasons have been well documented. Interestingly, they are the only undefeated teams in the AVCA top 25.
The other four unbeatens are Arizona State (12-0), Cal (12-0), The Citadel (12-0) and Wyoming (11-0), and all but The Citadel have first-year head coaches.
Arizona State went 13-19 last season, 7-13 in the Pac-12. USC assistant JJ Van Niel took over and has the Sun Devils off to the program’s best start since 2015, which also the last year ASU went to the NCAA Tournament. ASU has hardly played the toughest schedule, but it has statistically dominated opponents while dropping only three sets so far. Latvian senior right side Marta Levinska leads with 155 kills, 3.97/set, and 24 aces, and outside Geli Cyr has 131 kills, 3.54/set. Cyr, a 5-10 junior, is one of eight players on Division I rosters from from Flower Mound, Texas,
On one hand, you can say that Cal (11-0) has played a much less challenging schedule that most top teams. But considering that Crissy Jones Schoonderwoerd was promoted to head coach less than two weeks before practice began in August and her only assistant at the time was the legendary Savannah Rennie — in her first paying gig — it’s pretty remarkable.
Cal finished 7-23 last season, 7-3 in the pre-conference and 0-20 in the Pac-12. The Bears have lost 55 conference matches in a row. Will Cal break that streak this year? It will be tough, but one bright spot is the emergence of Chinese freshman Maggie Li, a 6-foot-3 outside from Beijing who was on the Chinese women’s national U20 team in 2022, which took second place at the Asian U20 Women’s Championship. This season for Cal, she has 162 kills, averaging 4.15 kills/set, while hitting .288 with 18 aces, and is second on the team at 2.77 digs/set. She’s second only to USC’s Skyler Fields (5.30) and Oregon’s Mimi Colyer (4.49) in kills per set in the Pac-12.
Teammate Sam Taumoepeau, a 6-foot senior outside from San Diego who sat out the last half of the 2022 season injured, is right behind Li with 143 kills (3.76/set) and also has 18 aces.
The Citadel has had only two seasons in which the program won 12 matches total. Coach Dave Zelenock, 46-63 overall and 22-42 in the SoCon in five seasons, has slowly put the program on an upward trajectory. The leader again has been junior Ali Ruffin, who is third in the NCAA with 206 kills. The 5-11 outside from Greenville, North Carolina, was third in the SoCon in kills per set last season (3.83).
Wyoming and coach Kaylee Prigge, who was promoted after last season’s 10-20 finish, is unbeaten after pre-conference play for the first time. The Cowgirls have an outstanding 1-2-3 offensive punch in sophomore Rylee Schulz (136 kills, 3.32/set), sophomore middle Tierney Barlow (135 kills, 3.29/set) and senior outside Corin Carruth (109 kills, 2.66/set). Barlow has 47 blocks, a whopping 15 solo. Carruth is one of three players on the roster from Wyoming.
There are eight teams in the top 25 with one loss, No. 3 Florida, No. 5 Louisville, No. 6 Oregon, No. 10 BYU, No. 13 Georgia Tech, No. 14 Tennessee, No. 17 Kansas and No. 24 Auburn.
Stats and notes
The new AVCA top 25 came out Monday. There were no major shakeups and no one dropped out. See the complete poll here.
The others from Flower Mound, Texas:
Ifenna Cos-Okpalla, a sophomore middle at Texas A&M; Kaylee Cox, a junior outside at Western Kentucky who transferred from Missouri; Madison Dyer, a sophomore middle at FAU; Caroline Dykes, a junior setter who transferred from ETSU to South Florida; Abby Ekeler, a junior DS at Tennessee; Sarah Martinez, a junior DS at Arkansas State; and Camryn Upshaw, a senior middle at Charlotte. The aforementioned Ifenna Co-Okpalla, the 6-2 sophomore middle at Texas A&M, leads the NCAA in blocks per set at 1.82. Colgate senior middle Sophie Thompson leads in overall with 70, 10 solo …
Indiana junior setter Camryn Haworth has an NCAA-leading 33 aces in 43 sets. Akron freshman Eliska Vytiskova is next with 32 …
Tulsa senior outside Kayley Cassaday has 228 kills, 11 more than Dayton junior outside Lexie Almodovar after getting 35 on Saturday, the same day that Western Kentucky’s Paige Briggs also had 35 kills …
Morgan Romano, who transferred this season to Chattanooga after four years at Rider, is the leader among active players with 1,763 kills. Jillian Gillen, the 5-7 outside for Arkansas, is second at 1,731, followed by Abbie Jackson of Houston (1,720) and USC’s Skylar Fields (1,720) …
Idaho State director of athletics Pauline Thiros, who did a tremendous job as chair of the NCAA volleyball committee, finally has this year off. But her daughter, Zoe, is off to a great start for Gonzaga. The 5-11 graduate student leads her team with 118 kills (3.28/set), has 13 aces, and is second in digs with 98, 2.72/set. The Zags are 3-8 headed into their first WCC match Thursday at San Francisco …
Speaking of the DI chair, that role is being filled this year by Loyola Chicago deputy director of athletics/senior woman administrator Holly Strauss-O’Brien. Strauss-O’Brien played at North Carolina, including the team that finished 32-4 and went to the 2002 NCAA Tournament round of 16.
Zooming, volleyball and laughs
And if you missed our Monday NCAA Zoom, you should carve out a half hour just for the laughs. The Big Ten Network’s Emily Ehman, who is calling the Georgia Tech-at-Clemson match Wednesay for ESPN, and VolleyballMag.com editor Lee Feinswog were joined by Notre Dame coach Salima Rockwell and Southern Miss coach Jenny Hazelwood.
Watch the video here:
The most fun NCAA Zoom as ND begins ACC play; USM readies for Sun Belt
Notre Dame, which is 6-2, has won four in a row, beating Illinois, Oklahoma and Toledo twice. The Irish play host to BC and Syracuse this weekend. Southern Miss is 5-6 and opens Sun Belt play with back-to-back matches at South Alabama.
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