Hawaii up to No. 10, no weekly honors
http://www.avca.org/divisions/division-one-women/poll-9-28-2015/
Hawaii up to 10.
one of the biggest drops was previous No. 10 BYU to 15th.
Not that it’s a huge deal but I do wish people would use legit email addresses so I can respond to them without involving the blog.
But the answer is: Ann Miller started working at the Advertiser in 1980.
I started working at the Star-Bulletin in 1981,
We both covered Wahine volleyball until Ann retired in early 2014.
although I took a couple of seasons off, including when I was the Star-Bulletin sports editor in 2000-01.
COMMENTS
Comments are closed.
Kewl, step by step, inch by inch. LBSU up 1 as well. Can’t wait till Wahine take them on.
When was the last time UH was in the top 10 ?
Didn’t realize Dave was voting in the polls this year.
#2 believe it was 2013, when then #11 UH beat #1 Texas in season opener, and UH jumped up to #5, before ending up at #18
3. Yep, mentioned that a few weeks ago.
2-4. last was at No. 8 on Oct. 21, 2013
Thanks for the great work Cindy. You’re a lifeline to us Wahine fans in the Pacific Northwest that can only watch the ladies on line. Wish the Big West had a team closer to us. But DON’T want to see them in Seattle again. Want to watch them hosting from the confines of the Stanley.
So, are we a final 16 or Final 8 team? I am of course dreaming that we get a very favorable bracket and make it all the way.
It has already been talked about but my main concern remains that if we don’t receive well, and/or Nikki and Olivia start to stall, our OHs (Kalei/Tai) will likely struggle as neither are terminators like a Emily Hartong, and often depend on 1:1 situations. What are our options?
for the Wahine, the first pass to the setter at the net is critical because it isolates the opponents middle blocker to the middle, which in turn creates a gap for our outside hitters. Most of Tai’s passes to the setter, only reach the 10 feet line, give or take a foot or two, which eliminates the middles. Only the Florida game was she on target. IMO, she needs to change her mechanics (after 3 -1/2 years of lousy passing), but can our coaches accomplish that? She changed her serve, so why not? Just wishful thinking.
6. thanks for the kind words
7. as you say, favorable bracket a key.
as for serve-receive your options will depend on the rotation. If it looks like Manu-Olevao is struggling again, but they want to keep her in the back row for the 3-meter option, they they’ll do what they have done with her (and Huff in that one match) They’ll shade them out of the formation, meaning the libero or DS will ‘poach’ on that area.
Both Granato and Castillo have practiced 3-meter attacks.
Disagree a little about Greeley and Manu-Olevao not being terminators. They just aren’t consistent enough at it. Taylor is the designated ‘bail-out’ person, much as Hartong and Danielson were most recently.
Some people put too much emphasis on stats IMHO. That Taylor doesn’t always hit for a high percentage doesn’t mean that much when you take into consideration that the set is off. If you make a play on the ball, regardless of what kind of a set, still considered an attempt.
Same with the analysis of Manu-Olevao yesterday of Before Florida and After Florida. Perhaps she has done better statistically but it was also against lesser teams with smaller blocks. In some rotations, she is supposed to pass that particular team’s best server, in others she isn’t.
Think you’d have to go back and chart exactly who was serving and what kind of server they are to get a truer picture. And that would require having way way too much time on one’s hands.
as for Big West honors, POW went to CSUN’ Stinson (Manu-Olevao nominated) , FOY to The Beach’s Owens (no UH nominee)
DOY to The Beache’s Benson (Magill nominated)
http://www.bigwest.org/aotw.asp
I doubt that you were referring to me but if I use my new e-mail address my comments go into pending never to be seen again.
Oh,Oh not this time.
11-12. The only time I know it’s not a real email address is when I try to email person off the blog and it bounces back.
Usually once your IP address has been approved, using a new email doesn’t affect things.
BTW for those who are interested in pseudo RPI (NCAA’s will come out soon)
Hawaii is 14 in Pablo, 18 in RKPI. Rich has UH at 10 in his poll, matching the AVCA’s rank
Manu-Olevao nominated as player of the week? OMG!!!!!
Should have been Emily Maglio. She was steady and important to both games this weekend.
#15 Tai hit .316 and .368 for OH.
By the way Cindy: great analysis in comment #9. It really makes the season more enjoyable to have your observations and comments here online in addition to the newspaper stories. Much more educational for us fans.
Happy for the #10 ranking, but I hope the team doesn’t get over confident and let there guard down on the road. Any word on whether all players will travel or will some get held back like last year?
Hope Mitchem will get more playing time somewhere on the court. She’s only here for 2 years, so it’d be a shame if half that time she’d be playing behind Maglio.
Re: Tai. She’s not perfect, but she’s much improved over the start of the season and I don’t think anyone on the bench (at this point) can do better.
I don’t profess to know much about volleyball except what I see. Even the stats go over my head, but I can figure out some of them. Besides, I’ve only been back home since 2009.
So, Cindy, could you educate this ol’ codger as to what “Hawaii is 14 in Pablo, 18 in RKPI. Rich has UH at 10 in his poll, matching the AVCA’s rank”.
Agree with connor – Thanks Cindy for giving some of us wannabes some education and insight. I’m like a sponge, but I can never get enough of the wahine. They’re really exciting this year. In the 6 years I’ve been home, I’ve never seen the middles as strong as they are now. They’re not just putting it down, they’re pounding it down, especially Mags. GO BOWS!
Tongo:
Maglio .556 and .615, 1 BS and 8 BA
Olevao .316 and .368
Who are the most outstanding player this weekend? Olevao’s percentages are getting better but she was not the most outstanding Bow this weekend.
Of the 329 NCAA D1 women’s volleyball teams, 5 are left standing with a slim-to-no chance for a perfect regular (nonconference and conference) season.
14-0 #2 USC/Pac-12 … Next: 10/2 @ Washington St … 10/4 @ #5 Washington
14-0 #12 KANSAS/Big 12 …. Next: 10/3 vs West Virginia … Is the Big 12 — with only 9 women’s volleyball teams — one of the Power 5s when it comes to volleyball?
13-0 #1 PENN STATE/Big Ten … Next: 10/2 vs #4 Nebraska .. 10/3 vs #33 Iowa
13-0 #6 ARIZONA STATE/Pac-12 … Next: 10/2 vs #8 Stanford … 10/4 vs California
12-0 #5 WASHINGTON/Pac-12 … Next: 10/2 @ #11 UCLA … 10/4 @ #2 USC
_________
Still waiting for the release of the Pac-12’s Offensive POW, which could be Samy Bricio who had 34 points/27 kills in that great match against Stanford … If she’s so named, it will be the 4th time in 5 weeks she’s been chosen by the Pac-12, and she should be a shoo-in for National POW.
Bricio is such a stud!… way to step it up as Senior!
#20 I can read the box score too and was aware of Emily %. Apparently, the coach thought otherwise.
Still think Texas is a bit overrated…
15..16..20 .. 23 ……Olevao had 23.5 pts total for the two matches including 4 services aces, one service error ( though 2 reception errors) . Maglio had 18 total pts.
19. Sorry I cannot educate anyone on how Pablo or Rich Kern do their rankings. they use a statistical program of which I am not privy.
I don’t understand the NCAA rankings either. But perhaps Maverick will drop in and help us out, although we agree to disagree about how the data is inputted.
To me a real person has to do the inputting which, IMO, indicates room for bias.
I have yet to get an answer as to how they get the starting base for the analysis.
As for nominations, UH’s SID does it after consulting with the coaching staff.
I wasn’t a fan of Olevao and Kahakai in the first couple of weeks, but I’m happy that they have stepped up their game. Kahakai is starting to show some consistency as a passer and her defense has been outstanding. Olevao has been more effective on offense, but I do wish Shoji uses someone for her in the passing formation. Let’s face it, Nikki Taylor isn’t that great a passer either.
One little complaint though: Higgins still sets Magill too low. Yes, the passing isn’t perfect, but a decent setter would be able to put up a hittable set. And yes, maybe Magill jumps early sometimes, but is it the hitter’s job to adjust to the setter, or is it the setter’s job to recognize her hitter’s tendencies and put up the appropriate set?
26. As a service to the blog, I will respond to inquiry. To be clear, Cindy and I do not have a disagreement about how the data is input. This is because I have never commented on the process for data input. Cindy: I and another poster still do not understand what you mean by data input and room for bias. As a service to this blog, I respectfully request you elaborate so we can understand your view.
I do not know the process for score reporting and data input into the NCAA RPI model. Cindy, why not use your contacts at the NCAA (I assume you have them, but I could be incorrect) to get a better understanding of this?
I know that the independent RPI modeler downloads the scores that are reported on NCAA.co daily scoreboard. It may be a manual process for him, I haven’t asked although anyone is free to query him. He is very responsive.
Normally, the way these things work (i.e., updating of data-intensive models) is that an automatic download is generated, not a manual input of the data. The more data there is, the more labor-intensive it would be and thus the role of automation in the internet age to address this. Unless the scores are misreported to the NCAA, it is difficult to see how the data would be corrupted unless there is an internal bad actor. And that actor would really have to pay attention to the scores he is inputting to ensure certain conferences are benefitting to the detriment to others, and he would have to do it a lot, not just one or two, in order to impact the RPI scoring. Assuming a team plays 30 matches (round numbers for simplicity), and there are about 330 teams, that means that there are 9,900 total matches that are played. You need to impact a lot of those matches through inputting to generate a favorable result for a set of teams, like those in the SEC. Also note that from an RPI perspective, a team that plays 30 matches will have 30 data points for the first component of the RPI, nearly 900 for the second component, and almost 27,000 for the third component. You need to impact quite a lot of matches to benefit a few teams. And someone would notice that level of activity. More in my next post…
26. Continuing…
Also note that the RPI only cares about wins and losses, so if the scores are set to the model, then the model would automatically determine the winner/loser for purposes of the RPI, unless the IT folks at the NCAA live in the Stone Age.
Another note: the independent modeler’s RPI ranking has a very good level of agreement with the official NCAA RPI rankings–not perfect, but very good. Because he is independent, and he has no apparent bias toward making the SEC/ACC look better in the RPI than they actually are, it seems equally unlikely that the NCAA has that same bias. If so, the two RPI rankings would bear very little resemblance to each other or would have the SEC/ACC teams in much higher ranking positions across the board in the NCAA model relative to the independent model. That has not happened. As such, either there is no NCAA bias as suggested, or the bad actors trying to create such a bias are really bad at their jobs.
I provided a logical, data-driven explanation for why we see a lot more power 5 schools in the top RPI rankings than non-power five. Some of it has to do with the fact that many of these teams are better as reflected in their W-L records. Some has to do with very smart scheduling: playing out of conference teams with very good W-L records. Some has to do with overall conference success beating non-conference competition: Big West is below .500 against non-con opponents, the power five is at least in the .600 to .700 range. And that works for the second and third components of the RPI. The highest ranked RPI teams have some combination of the three.
I also provided data that showed non-power five teams that are highly ranked in the RPI despite not being traditional volleyball powerhouses, and SEC teams that had stellar records but were ranked in the 80s to address the assertion that the SEC is getting unwarranted love from the NCAA model. Not much more that I can do on that front.
Final comment: I’ve stated this several times recently, and this is not a secret. The RPI is not a reflection of a team’s quality nor is it a predictive measure of how a team will perform vs. another team. I think Pablo is modeled to address the second item. That the NCAA uses such a model to seed the tournament (seedings supposedly being a reflection of a team’s quality) is unfortunate and may be the source of the bias to which Cindy has referred.
Explanation of the Pablo rating system:
http://middlehitter.com/MHPR/Rankings/Pablo_Rankings_FAQ-MHPR_Version.pdf
Hi Cindy,
I saw ur previous post about the point is to win. Yes, this is true. But winning now is nothing compared to the ultimate win, which is at the end. This is the time to develop team by building depth. So wen we r in the tournament, we have a full team effort in trying to achieve the ultimate win. I think playing ur subs n having them struggle through obstacles, we will b stronger at the end of season n more ready to tackle the tournament. The question a coach should ask is, is it better to play all starters n win 3 sets easily or play ur subs during sets n mostly in set 3 to build ur team depth? I gotta believe that depth is a big key in winning the entire thing n we jus r not doing it. So much talent being under utilized. Chemistry wit jus 7 players is not going to get it done.
14. Interestingly, the independent RPI modeler in Ohio has UH at 18, which matches Rich Kern’s ranking (http://www.richkern.com/vb/rankings/RKPIShow.asp). RK tries to replicate the NCAA model and could include bonus points for beating top 25 competition, which could explain why the top teams have higher RPI scores in his model relative to the independent guy’s model.
well rpi, power 5, ncaa (no clue at all), bias or not. we all know that the acc and sec are weaklings in volleyball with the exception of florida, florida state, and was it last year missouri made it legit?
power 5/power conferences dont mean jack crack. only for football and too much obsession with fantasy football at that.
Re: National POW
The Pac-12 has awarded an Offensive POW 5 times this season, and the same player has been honored 4 of those 5 times. Expect USC’s Samy Brio, again Pac-12 Offensive POW, to be named National POW this week.
Re: NCAA Women’s Volleball D I Rating Percentage Index (RPI)
So much of what has been posted by fans about the RPI is a lot of sound and fury that doesn’t amount to much. Let’s keep to the facts, dear wannabe statisticians. On the day before the NCAA Tournament’s Selection Sunday last year, here’s the official stats the NCAA Selection Committee considered first and foremost:
Hawai’i
Non Div I (record) 0-0
Div I (record) 21-6
Div I Win % 34th/.7778
Strength of Schedule 70th/.5534
Opp Str of Schd 77th/.5312
Road Success 36th/.6268
Road RPI 33rd/.6124
Normal RPI 36TH/.6040
Bonus 2
Penalty 0
Adj RPI 39TH/.6088
In contrast, let’s look at last year’s eventual NCAA champion.
Penn State
Non Div I (record) 0 – 0
Div I (record) 30 – 3
Div I Win % 8th/.9091
Strength of Schedule 57th/.5633
Opp Str of Schd 29th/.5669
Road Success 8th/.7264
Road RPI 8th/.6668
Normal RPI 8TH/.6507
Bonus 7 (low when you consider all teams ranked above PSU in the adjusted RPI had at least 9 bonus points; Stanford, which had the #1 RPI going into the tournament play, had 22 bonus points)
Penalty 0
Adj RPI 9th/.6633
P.S. The TOTALLY OBJECTIVE RPI versus the OBJECTIVE BUT NOT TOTALLY RPI debate centers (I think) around the “Bonus”. Remember last year when the 17th RPI team received 11 “bonus” which was just enough for it to become the 16th RPI team, while the 16th RPI team with only 7 “bonus” fell to 17th in the Adjusted RPI (i.e. final RPI). Call it for what it is: wiggle room.
Samantha “Samy” BRICIO
33. Instead of being so smug, you could have provided the source of this data as a service to this blog. The source, which I just found, is: https://rpiarchive.ncaa.org/default.aspx
Apparently there are bonus points awarded. I’ll have to research further to understand the calculation.
33. Why “apparently”? And the source of the data is no secret. The NCAA certainly doesn’t keep it a secret, as they make it available in the archives for anyone interested.
How are strength of schedules determined? Is there a formula that looks back, let’s say 10 years, at a team’s final record that establishes team strength? Then these rankings are used in calculating future strength of schedules?
Hot, what’s interesting is she seems to set Maglio and Mitchem without problems, yet continues to struggle setting Magill with consistency. In some case you can see the set is too low, but in other cases the timing appears off. I guess this is when Magill jumps too early? I find this interesting. It is not a complaint. I think Tayler is a really good setter that does many things well. Most recently she seems to have picked up on her digging. Her overall game is solid.
Wow, this blog is really deep…. OrbitalRipZ – “sound and fury”; was that a MacBeth reference? Just asking.
H-Man, I think Tayler is a little bit afraid of Magill and thinks too much because of this fear of not giving Magill exactly what she wants. She is more natural and spontaneous with the other middles. I could be wrong but I see it in her eyes.
I’m a wahine fan but if we don’t play the reserves and find different combinations for situations we will get the same results. We will get a good record and might host a first round match but then lose in the regional when we play the bigger teams again. We need to play Castillo, Mitchem, Grannato and Koelich more. We have the height but if we don’t use it in game time we will never beat Washington, USC , Texas, or Penn ST. History keeps repeating itself for us.
33. Wrong. AVCA National POW went to a player from St. Louis of the Atlantic-10 Conference. (St. Louis did topple SEC’s Missouri from the D I unbeaten ranks last week.) Guess this is the year the AVCA is going all out to recognize non-Power 5 conferences, as thus far 80% of the National POWs chosen this year are from conferences outside of the Power 5.
#40 Really? Really? Unbelievable.
At the end of the playoff season we will know if recent history will continue to repeat itself. I think Shoji wants to make sure he wins the league championship
and worry about the playoffs at that time.
Come playoff time, if Dave continues to play a front row of McGill, Higgins and Olevao, the wahine are going to have a hard time against the big fronts of the major powers. He needs to develop the height to combat the size of the opposition. My suggestion, move Mitchem to OH so she can go in for Olevao when the big fronts mandate a change. Olevao is fine for the smaller teams but we need options so she doesn’t need to force shots against the big blocks.
45. moving Mitchem to OH is not going to happen, not when she’s still trying to learn to be a MB at this level.
Anyway, thanks for the chat about the RPI. My questions have always been along the lines of 37. How are the strength of schedules attained and on what basis.?
http://hawaiiwarriorworld.com/?p=33495
Tuesday thread up