https://www.avca.org/polls/di-women/9-26-2016.html

If you were referring to my breakdown of the 1st set of the Cal Poly match, I thank you for reading it and thinking about it. However I’d guide you to a different ‘bottom line’ conclusion if possible; that is that we agree that a fast offense and quick sets are wholly appropriate for Cal Poly’s personnel and their program. But is that it, and nothing else to learn?

I was interested in how much of Cal Polys 1st set success was wholly attributable to their ability to get kills in system, and how much of their success came from Hawaii’s errors. A fast quick system is not primarily responsible for the other teams errors. The ability to block and serve well can assist the opposition in generating their errors, but those are not attributes of a fast quick setting system. The opposition has primary control of their errors against the block and in choosing personnel and positioning for serve receive.

My breakdown showed that Cal Pol in system was relatively successful in their points 1 – 15, clearly generating for them 5 points. But their ability to generate points in system was relatively inconsequential in their points 16 – 34. In their points 16 – 34, fast quick generated only 3 of those 19 points. Hawaii’s nine errors accounted for 9 of their 19 points, which was 3x what Cal Poly was generating in system from their fast quick offense. To the extent that Cal Poly was doing a good job of serving, blocking, and playing high ball transition offense with lots of tipping, that helped Hawaii along in their error fest and self-demolition. But that is something that any team can do regardless of their primary offensive system, and it is wholly wrong to point to fast quick as responsible for Cal Polys success in their come back against Hawaii in set 1, as clearly it was something else going on in those points 16 – 34.

My bottom line for what I think might have helped Hawaii in Set 1 with reducing their attack errors, would have to been to employ the ‘neutral’ attack a bit more often. Keep the ball in, avoid the block, make them chase and make them generate high ball transition offense to their struggling ‘out of system’ OH, Van Winden. Hawaii has had success stopping her. Although Hawaii has struggled with her tips from time to time, they’ve shown they can adjust and control it. For most of the match they were ok against the tip, but in that set 1 they had one rotation from points #18, #20, and #21 that they failed to quickly adjust. As for improving serve receive and passing, they could utilize their DS’s a bit more. Many of Hawaii’s attack errors are generated from poor passing, resulting in not so great setting, followed by what the ‘eh hitting. Fewer attack errors follows from better sets follows from better passing. No non sequitur there.

It was noted that Hawaii’s errors outnumbered Cal Poly’s kills using a fast offense. Oddly, same thing occurred against other teams like UCLA and Washington (Hawaii had more kills than Washington). Hawaii’s attack errors against ranked teams is 22-25. Their errors against Cal Poly was 25.

The USA National team does use a fast offense/fast sets (winning the 2014 World’s Women Volleyball Championship) ongoing now for 4+ years. Perhaps someone should tell Karch Kiraly the problems with using a fast offense. After all, height does not appear to be his primary recruitment criteria. (Good thing they don’t play in a humid gym.)

Bottom Line: Comparing Hawaii’s errors to Cal Poly’s kills is a non sequitur.

Let’s give credit to the opposing blocks/defenses; which may explain why Hawaii’s errors are so consistent against strong teams.