Bernell DorroughGo to the Elite Eight
When: Sat., Nov. 22 at 7 p.m.
Who: Ohio Northern University
Where: WU Field House
After winning their matches against Fontbonne University and Wartburg College last weekend, the second-ranked Washington University Bears’ volleyball team has advanced to the NCAA Division III Quarterfinals. They will face Ohio Northern this weekend in Saturday’s Elite Eight match at 7 p.m. at the Field House.
The Bears squared off against Ohio Northern earlier this season and came away with a 3-0 win over the Polar Bears. However, they are not anticipating an easy win in this quarterfinal match.
“This weekend, we’re playing a team that’s really hot right now,” said head coach Rich Luenemann. “Ohio Northern just came off of a huge win at Wittenberg. Wittenberg entered the match rated No. 5 in America and Ohio Northern beat them on their own court. They may have improved more in the last month of the season than anybody else in America.”
The Bears have been gearing up for this weekend’s competition. Instead of their usual three weekly team practices, the Bears scheduled four practices this week.
“Aside from Juniata, [Ohio Northern] is going to be the best team we’ve played because their players are extremely athletic and extremely scrappy,” said junior Ishi Ballew. “They’ve been the underdogs basically all through post-season. They’ll be really pumped to play.”
In order to prepare for this weekend’s match, the Bears are studying their opponent’s technique.
“We have some tapes coming in from teams that they’ve played in the last month,” said Luenemann. “We’re going to break those tapes down, watch for tendencies, and watch for things that they do that we can capitalize on.”
After last weekend’s tight match with Wartburg, the team realizes that it needs to buckle down if it wants to make it to the National Championship.
“We fell back a bit when we played Wartburg,” said Luenemann. “We had ten more service errors than they did, and we thought we had rectified that part of our game. [Although] we had 23 more kills than Wartburg, we had to look to see where they made up the difference.”
After last weekend’s match, the coaches sat down and discussed what they wanted to work on throughout the week.
“Outside hitters have to score more. That’s a huge priority for us,” said Luenemann. “It is essential that right-side attackers put up a firm block on the rightside. Our setter has to do an incredible job of dealing the ball to the correct people in the correct situations.”
During Monday’s practice, the team tweaked their serve-receive patterns.
“We changed serve-receive attack patterns somewhat to maximize the strengths of our players and the effectiveness of our attack,” said Luenemann. “We need to make sure that we work on shoring up where we make mistakes, particularly our serving game.”
This week’s practices have been very focused as the Bears prepare for the upcoming competition. The players have done an excellent job of maintaining momentum during matches and throughout their practices, according to Luenemann.
“Our energy has been great,” said Luenemann. “I really have to laud the bench. The bench has done an incredible job of keeping the team positive and enthusiastic. When the players have a multitude of things to worry about, sometimes one of the last things that they worry about is energy level. The energy and enthusiasm from the bench carries over into crowd participation and into our play.”
The players appreciate crowd support and recognize the importance of having energetic fans rooting for them.
“It’s not going to be an easy win,” said junior Colleen Winter. “It’s something we’re going to have to work for. You definitely can tell the difference the fans make. If you have people cheering for you, it adds to your game. We’re really excited that we’re home.”
“Ohio Northern is a team that is very emotional – they ride off of their fans. Their fans are loud and they’ll probably bring a large crowd.”
The Bears hope to meet and exceed the number of fans who attended last year’s home quarterfinal match against Hayward.
“Without a doubt, the crowd plays a very important part in the success of the Bears’ volleyball program,” said Luenemann. “That was evident last year in the quarterfinals match with Hayward. We’re hoping that that [the University] community and the greater St. Louis area will come out to support the Bears so we have 1,500 or 2,000 fans in the bleachers.”