Tennessee is 40-7 all time vs Mississippi State.
The Lady Vols finished off the first half of their SEC double round robin schedule in first place with a 9-1 mark — easily their best record at the half way point since the conference went to this format in 2006.
HALF-WAY THROUGH THE SEC YEAR HALF-WAY FINAL 2006 6-4 10-10 2007 3-7 6-14 2008 6-4 15-5 2009 8-2 16-4 2010 7-3 15-5 2011 9-1 The Lady Vols have recorded sweeps in every match during their current 7 game streak over the Bulldogs.
Mississippi State’s .025 team hitting percentage is the 12th lowest average the Lady Vols have held a team to since 2001.
Tennessee hit .164 on Wednesday vs Kentucky and .198 on Sunday vs State. That’s the first time the team has had back to back matches under .200 since September 2009.
Assuming my data is right (and I think it is!), UT head coach Rob Patrick has moved into 5th place on the winningest SEC coach in conference history list.
SEC CAREER COACHING RECORDS* 1 Mary Wise Florida 1991- 646-72 2 Fran Flory Kentucky 1993-1997
LSU 1998-
Total 1993-78-80
261-151
339-2313 Sid Feldman Georgia 1978-1988 318-135 4 Chris Poole Arkansas 1994-2007 316-161 5 Rob Patrick Tennessee 1997- 308-153 Scott Luster LSU 1985-1997 308-161 * these are career wins while at an SEC school, not just conference wins
The Bulldogs fought off several match points and took the last set beyond regulation but in the end fell in another sweep to Tennessee (25-19, 25-18, 28-26). The Lady Vols finish off the first half of their SEC double round robin schedule in first place with a 9-1 mark — easily their best record at the half way point since the conference went to this format in 2006. More later tonight!
UPDATE: Kelsey Robinson got her 18th career double double with 13 kills and 12 digs. She was the only player on either side of the net with double digit kills. DeeDee Harrison and Tiffany Baker had 7 each while Carly Sahagian had 6. Baker and Stephanie Stoll knocked back 5 blocks each — career highs for both players. Mary Pollmiller had 33 assists. Ellen Mullins had 15 digs. Pollmiller and Nikki Brice each had 2 aces. Tennessee held State to a .025 hitting percentage, their lowest of the season and our best defensive showing of the year in that stat. But the Bulldogs also held us under .200, our lowest average of the year in a win.
Tennessee is 39-7 all time vs Mississippi State. The Lady Vols lead 9-1 in their last 10 meetings, and they are on a 6 match winning streak vs the Bulldogs. UT is also 9-1 in the last 10 meetings in Starkville.
Tennessee’s only loss to MSU in the past 15 years was in 2007. Their previous loss to Mississippi State was in 1996. The setter for that Bulldog squad was freshman Jenny Head — now Jenny Hazelwood, their head coach.
The Lady Vols have recorded sweeps in every match during their current 6 game streak over the Bulldogs.
Tennessee assistant coach Rachel Cooper was a four year starting outside hitter for Mississippi State from 2002-2005. She was twice named the team’s MVP, was the first MSU player named SEC Player of the Week, was named to the SEC Academic Honor Roll three times, and won the school’s Newsom Award which honors scholar-athletes. She still stands 3rd in school history in career kills, 3rd in attack attempts, and 10th in aces. Against Tennessee she had 258 attack attempts during her career, which is the 13th most by a UT opponent in the rally scoring era.
Mississippi State alumna and head coach Hazelwood is the only current SEC head coach to also have attended an SEC school. She played for State from 1996-1999 and still ranks 8th in the conference record book for career assists. She’s looking for her first win against Rob Patrick this weekend. As a player, her MSU team defeated Tennessee during the 1996 regular season then later that year did it again knocking them out of the SEC tournament. In 1997, Coach Patrick took over the UT program and the Lady Vols defeated the Bulldogs during the remainder of Hazelwood’s playing career. As a head coach, she is 0-5 vs Tennessee, with 4 losses vs the Lady Vols at MSU and 1 loss in 2006 when she was the head coach at Centenary.
I mentioned on another website earlier this season that I thought Hazelwood would have Mississippi State competing for the SEC West title within a few years. I was wrong — they are in the thick of the title chase today. At 5-4 they’re just half a game behind 4-3 LSU for the division lead.
Two days after #25 Kentucky defeated Tennessee in a five set nailbiter earlier this week, they got swept 3-0 by the Bulldogs. It was the first win over a ranked opponent in program history for Mississippi State, and it happened in front of the largest crowd to witness a college volleyball game in the entire state of Mississippi.
Freshman Tiffany Baker’s sister Chanelle plays for Mississippi State. The junior has been a three year starting outside hitter for the Bulldogs. In her first match vs Tennessee in 2009 she hit .600, which is the 12th highest hitting percentage (with double digit attacks) by a UT opponent since 2001.
Mississippi State’s Caitlin Rance is 10 kills away from career #1000.
Mississippi State (10-8, 5-4)
UT leads all time series 39-7.
UT won the last meeting 3-0.
Game time is Sunday, October 15th at 2:30pm ET
Follow the match: Gametracker | live video (not sure if it’s free)Official match notes: Mississippi State (PDF) | Tennessee
SEC TEAM RANKINGS – CONFERENCE MATCHES TEAMS ACES ASSISTS BLOCKS DIGS HIT% KILLS OPP HIT% 5th 1st 5th 5th 3rd 1st 1st 9th 8th 7th 3rd 9th 8th 8th
higher ranked team lower ranked team UPDATED
It was an exciting, if a bit ugly, match in Lexington last night. I don’t want to say Tennessee looked tired, but they did play off their game it seemed. And for such a young team after so many road games this year and another five set match just three days prior who could really blame them if they were. Kentucky’s serve receive was phenomenal and their passing game was great, but overall I still think they were beatable if we had played a little cleaner match. In other words, we’ll get them next time!
Tennessee is now 28-40 all time vs Kentucky. The Wildcats snap UT’s 5 game winning streak over them.
UK also snapped Tennessee’s 11 match winning streak, their 8 match SEC winning streak this season, and their 11 match overall conference winning streak.
Ellen Mullins shattered her previous career high of 20 digs with an impressive 31 digs vs Kentucky. That’s the third most digs by an SEC player this year, and just the 4th time this year an SEC player has reached the 30 dig mark.
Mullins’ 31 digs is the 10th most by a Lady Vol in program history. The last time anyone had as many was September 2008 when Chloe Goldman had 36 vs Dayton.
Tennessee took 195 swings in the match. That’s the most attack attempts since a September 2009 match vs LSU where the team had 197.
Both teams had an identical (and fairly abysmal) .164 hitting percentage. That’s the first time since at least 2001 UT and their opponent have had matching hitting percentages.
Kentucky didn’t allow the Lady Vols a single ace. That’s a first for this season. It’s just the 4th time since 2001 the team has been held aceless in a five set match.
Coach Patrick’s orange pants are now 1-1.
After Tennessee owning Memorial Coliseum the past several years, the Wildcats finally protect their house in the closest manner possible — a five setter ending in a 15-13 win for Kentucky. I’m in Lexington tonight so look for updates tomorrow.
UPDATE: It’s 2:30 in the morning so I’m heading to bed. But I’ve updated the stats and roster info. (They only take a few seconds to do with my new system compared to a couple of hours it took when I first started this site!) There’s some interesting numbers in the box score I’ll get to later as well. (Those include Ellen Mullins shattering her digs career high!)
I’ll talk more about the game in the morning but I just wanted to say that I was very proud of Kelsey Robinson tonight for not taking anything off that final serve on Kentucky’s match point in the fifth set. It would have been completely understandable if she’d played it safe and just dinked it over the net. But she has been a fierce competitor all season and that didn’t change just because they were in a tight spot. Just another reason to be impressed with the sophomore and hopeful for the future of Tennessee volleyball.
The NCAA and SEC have updated their weekly statistical rankings of players and teams for the 2011 season. The national stats rank 322 teams and the top 250 players in each category. All stats (except hitting percentage) are “per set”, not totals. I’ve also listed Tennessee’s rank in the polls. Click the underlined links to see the full season’s national rankings charted week-to-week.
moved UP from last week stayed EVEN with last week moved DOWN from last week
POLLS NATIONAL SEC AVCA Poll 18th ↑1 2nd –0 RichKern.com Poll 17th ↑1 2nd –0 Pablo Rankings 18th ↓9 2nd –0 Volleyball Magazine Poll 18th ↑2 2nd –0 RKPI 10th ↓4 2nd ↓1
NATIONAL TEAM RANKINGS ACES ASSISTS BLOCKS DIGS HIT% KILLS 112th
↓3322nd
↓2115th
↑1136th
↓1912th
↑415th
↓5
NATIONAL INDIVIDUAL RANKINGS ACES Kelsey Robinson 19th ↓3 ASSISTS Mary Pollmiller 8th –0 BLOCKS DeeDee Harrison 122nd ↑25 DIGS Ellen Mullins 239th ↓12 HITTING PERCENTAGE Leslie Cikra 129th ↑NR HITTING PERCENTAGE Shealyn Kolosky 159th ↓30 HITTING PERCENTAGE Carly Sahagian 173rd ↓63 KILLS Kelsey Robinson 11th ↓4 POINTS Kelsey Robinson 6th ↓2
SEC TEAM RANKINGS – ALL MATCHES ACES ASSISTS BLOCKS DIGS HIT% KILLS OPP HIT% 5th
↓12nd
–08th
–05th
–02nd
–02nd
↓15th
↓1
SEC INDIVIDUAL RANKINGS – ALL MATCHES ACES Kelsey Robinson 1st –0 ASSISTS Mary Pollmiller 1st –0 BLOCKS DeeDee Harrison 5th ↑2 DIGS Ellen Mullins 7th ↓1 HITTING PERCENTAGE Leslie Cikra 6th ↑3 HITTING PERCENTAGE Shealyn Kolosky 11th ↓3 HITTING PERCENTAGE Carly Sahagian 13th ↓6 KILLS Kelsey Robinson 1st –0 POINTS Kelsey Robinson 1st –0
SEC TEAM RANKINGS – CONFERENCE MATCHES ACES ASSISTS BLOCKS DIGS HIT% KILLS OPP HIT% 3rd
–01st
–04th
↑16th
↓33rd
–01st
–02nd
↓1
SEC INDIVIDUAL RANKINGS – CONFERENCE MATCHES ACES Kelsey Robinson 1st –0 ASSISTS Mary Pollmiller 1st –0 BLOCKS DeeDee Harrison 1st –0 DIGS Ellen Mullins 5th ↓2 HITTING PERCENTAGE DeeDee Harrison 5th ↑1 KILLS Kelsey Robinson 1st –0 KILLS Leslie Cikra 10th ↑NR POINTS Kelsey Robinson 1st –0 POINTS Leslie Cikra 9th ↓2
Tennessee is 28-39 all time vs Kentucky. The teams are tied at 5-5 in their last 10 meetings, though the Lady Vols are on a 5 match winning streak vs the Wildcats. UT is 7-3 in the last 10 meetings in Lexington.
The Tennessee/Kentucky match-up is the longest running continuously played rivalry in Tennessee’s history — the teams have played each other at least once every year since at least 1978.
With a win on Wednesday, Tennessee would be 9-0 in the SEC for the first time in school history.
Kentucky hasn’t swept Tennessee since 1995.
Since 2001, the Lady Vols are 8-13 in matches where they and their opponent are both ranked in the top 25 of the AVCA Coaches Poll. Perhaps surprisingly, in those 21 matches Tennessee was the higher ranked team only 4 times. They are 1-3 in those matches.
UT has faced a ranked Kentucky team 3 times in the last decade. They are 3-0 in those matches.
The Lady Vols have faced a 25th ranked opponent 3 times in school history, and have lost all of them.
The Lady Vols have winning streaks of at least 5 matches going versus over half the conference.
UT CURRENT SEC WIN STREAKS Alabama 7 last loss: October 2007 Arkansas 8 September 2007 Auburn 3 November 2009 Florida 1 October 2010 Georgia 2 September 2010 Kentucky 5 October 2008 LSU 1 November 2010 Mississippi 7 November 2007 Mississippi State 6 October 2007 South Carolina 6 October 2008 Tennessee games have aired 7 times on an ESPN network over the years and the Lady Vols are 5-2 in those matches. The team has won 12 of their last 14 televised matches. This is the 3rd year in a row ESPNU has aired one of the UT/UK matches. Tennessee is 2-0 in those games.
#25 Kentucky (16-3, 7-1)
UK leads all time series 39-28.
UT won the last meeting 3-0.
Game time is Wednesday, October 12th at 8:00pm ET
Follow the match: Gametracker | live audio | ESPNUOfficial match notes: Kentucky | Tennessee
SEC TEAM RANKINGS – CONFERENCE MATCHES TEAMS ACES ASSISTS BLOCKS DIGS HIT% KILLS OPP HIT% 3rd 1st 4th 6th 3rd 1st 2nd 1st 3rd 3rd 9th 2nd 3rd 1st
higher ranked team lower ranked team
Congratulations to Kelsey Robinson who was named the AVCA National Player of the Week today! This is the 2nd year in a row a Tennessee player has won the award and Robinson is just the 4th Lady Vol to ever receive the honor (along with Kelli Scott in 2000, Kristen Andre in 2004, and Kayla Jeter in 2010). More info is available from the AVCA and UT.
Congratulations to Kelsey Robinson on her second SEC Offensive Player of the Week award! More from the press release is below.
In other news, the Lady Vols moved up one spot to #18 in the latest AVCA Coaches Poll. This week’s opponent, Kentucky, moved into the poll for the first time this year at #25 — making this week’s matchup a top 25 battle. In other systems, UT moved up a spot to #17 in the RichKern.com Poll, down nine spots in the Pablo Rankings, and down one spot in the RKPI.
SEC OFFENSIVE PLAYER OF THE WEEK: Kelsey Robinson
Outside Hitter, TennesseeRecorded her second 20-20 game of the season (20 kills, 20 digs) in a win over Ole Miss, giving her the SEC lead in double-doubles (12)
Had 15 kills, 13 digs and three assists in a three-set sweep over Alabama
Totaled 35 kills, 33 digs, four blocks, three aces and three assists in a 2-0 week for Tennessee. Her weekly totals pushed her to first in the SEC in points per set (5.49), kills per set (4.69) and aces per set (0.48)
Aided Tennessee to its 11th consecutive win, which is tied for the second-longest current winning streak in the nation
Due to the shortened week I’m going to be a little briefer than normal so I can get everything that I usually do Monday through Thursday done in just 2 days instead.
The Lady Vols are now 30-12 all time vs Alabama and 38-6 vs Mississippi.
Tennessee has been outhit 4 times this year: vs Illinois, Houston, Florida, and Mississippi. The first 2 were losses while the last 3 were five set matches.
Only one team held the Lady Vols to a lower hitting percentage than Mississippi this year — the current #1 team in the country, Illinois.
The match vs Mississippi was the 3rd five-setter vs the Rebels since 2003, but the first that Tennessee has won since then.
Before the weekend I was qualifying the current winning streak by saying it was the team’s sixth longest single season streak on record. There were a couple of instances where a winning streak stretched across two seasons that I was not counting on that list. But with 2 additional wins tacked on we can now remove that qualifier as 11 wins in a row tops those times.
UT ALL TIME WIN STREAKS 1980 22 Bob Bertucci 1973 20 Kaye Hart 2004 14 Rob Patrick 2011 11 Rob Patrick 1986 11 Bob Bertucci 1982 11 Bob Bertucci With 8 SEC wins in a row this year, Tennessee has matched their single regular season streak for consecutive conference wins.
Kelsey Robinson had 20 kills and 20 digs vs Mississippi. That’s the second time this year she has reached 20 in both those stats in the same match. Since 2001, only 2 other players have had a 20/20 game with kills and digs. Both did it when games went to 30 points, and neither did it twice in a career. (While it’s easier to get assists than kills, it’s still fairly rare. For completenesses sake: 3 setters since 2001 have had 7 20/20 games with assists and digs.)
20 KILL, 20 DIG MATCHES SINCE 2001 2011 Kelsey Robinson Mississippi W (5 sets) 20 kills, 20 digs 2011 Kelsey Robinson Maryland W (5 sets) 24 kills, 24 digs 2006 Yuliya Stoyanova Kentucky L (4 sets) 25 kills, 22 digs 2003 Amy Morris Georgia W (5 sets) 21 kills, 26 digs Nikki Fowler came close to a phenomenal 20/20/20 when she notched the first and only triple double in school history: 19 kills, 19 assists, and 18 digs.
DOUBLE DOUBLES
Kelsey Robinson: kills and digs vs Alabama and Mississippi
CAREER HIGHS MATCHED OR EXCEEDED
Tiffany Baker: hitting percentage
Jasmine Brown: attacks, digs (in a 5 set match)
Leslie Cikra: kills (in a 3 set match), hitting percentage (20+ attempts), solo blocks, points (in a 3 set match)
DeeDee Harrison: digs
Shealyn Kolosky: hitting percentage (5-9 attempts), aces (in a 5 set match), solo blocks, block assists (in a 3 set match), total blocks (in a 3 set match)
Ellen Mullins: attacks (in a 5 set match), aces (in a 5 set match), points (in a 5 set match)
Mary Pollmiller: hitting percentage, block assists (in a 3 set match)
As few home weekends as we’ve had so far you’d think I’d be more careful when it comes to taking photos! Friday night I had the wrong settings on my camera so almost all the pictures I took came out blurry. Today I forgot to put the memory card back in the camera before coming to the match so I was limited to just a few photos (which I mainly used on my daughter who was with me). Sorry! The shots that came out are now online.
The Lady Vols fought off an upset-minded Mississippi squad in 5 sets this afternoon in Knoxville. More details soon.
UPDATE: In a match Tennessee maybe should have lost, and would have if not for some resilient play down the stretch and (let’s admit it) some timely Mississippi errors, the Lady Vols pull off their 11th win in a row, 8th SEC win in a row this year, and 11th conference win in a row dating back to 2010. Kelsey Robinson picked up her 12th double double of the season with 20 kills and 20 digs. (BTW: Robinson is now the only player since at least 2001 to reach 20 digs and kills in a single match more than once in her career — more on that in the recap tomorrow.) Leslie Cikra put down 16 kills and Tiffany Baker had 10. DeeDee Harrison put back a match leading 6 blocks and hit .462. Ellen Mullins had 14 digs. Mary Pollmiller had 52 assists. Mississippi is just the second team this year to outhit Tennessee and then lose the game.
If you need a reason to make it out to the game this afternoon (other than the best reason of all — to support your team!), here are a few:
Tennessee will with recognize Rob Patrick for his 300th career win.
The team will attempt to win their 11th match in a row. That would tie for the 4th longest single season streak in school history.
The Lady Vols just returned from a 19 day, 4 match road trip and have only this weekend at home before hitting the road again for yet another 19 days and 4 matches. (In fact, from August 28th to October 28th the team will go 62 days with only 4 home games.)
Kids 12 and under get in free and get a free hot dog and drink, while any kid wearing their volleyball team jersey/shirt will also get in free.
$3 bucks for an adult ticket? C’mon! Where else in Knoxville can you get two hours of entertainment for less than $10 for the whole family?
The Lady Vols make it to 10 wins in a row with a 3-0 sweep of Alabama (25-23, 25-22, 25-15). Much more later…
UPDATES: Kelsey Robinson earned her 15th career double double with 15 kills and 13 digs. Leslie Cikra was just behind with 13 kills while hitting an amazing .524. Shealyn Kolosky had 5 blocks, while DeeDee Harrison and Cikra each added 3 more. Mary Pollmiller had 39 assists. Ellen Mullins dug up 12 balls.
Two other nice stats for this game:
The Dig for the Cure event was a big success. I think they said they raised over $2,000! (And I won the jersey of my favorite current player in the silent auction — no, I’m not saying who!)
And the match attendance was 1,999. That’s the second highest in school history!
For some reason my pictures didn’t come out great this week, but I’ll see what I can salvage. If you didn’t make it out to the match here’s a photo of what the pink jerseys looked like.
Coach Rob Patrick appeared on the Doc, Jeff, and Heather in the Morning radio show on local WNML today. They talked about the new expectations the young team has, the depth of the roster when players get hurt, and the Dig for the Cure match tonight. Archived audio of the show will be online later today in the 9:00am list on their website (but will be removed after the next show so listen soon).