I’d planned on going to this match earlier in the week. This would be my first in person, though I’d seen a couple of Aggie volleyball games on TV before. As I got ready to leave, I reconsidered. There was a good baseball game on and likely the last Rangers day game was coming up a bit later. Unlike some of the other Aggie sports I’ve been trying out, I already knew I liked volleyball. Since I was thinking about going to a night game during my vacation in a couple of weeks, I wanted to check the place out in the daytime first. I went with my gut and stayed with the plan. Was it the right call? Read on.
Wow, I was in the Pan-Am ticket office for the first time since grade school. I think it was to see the Harlem Globetrotters. I mention this because there was a mounted Harlem Globetrotters ball inside the office. Inside, I also see a very nice #3 Jordan Abalos poster on the wall. From what I’ve seen, she’s pretty much the star of the volleyball team. I’d picked up four posters at the NMSU soccer match last week, but this one wasn’t there.
I do pick up a nicely printed program. The girls and their uniforms look a bit different on the cover than currently, so I think the pictures are from last year. There’s another courtesy table where they’re handing out free Aggie t-shirts. Was this advertised? This was a heck of an unannounced giveaway. I’d meant to go the bookstore to find another white Aggie shirt after the match and here I just get handed one. Okay, now I feel good about coming even before the game starts. I do feel a little bad about depriving somebody of my business, but I did buy a new crimson shirt that I didn’t need after the soccer match, so maybe it evens out. On another table, they had posters lying out, but only the football one. Darn it! Now I want that Jordan poster. Oh well, you can’t have everything. Where would you put everything? (Actually, I’d put it on my cubicle wall next to my #10 Alieen Galicia soccer poster.)
At the concession, I get a medium Dr. Pepper (sorry, not liking the new Pepsi deal), that would be size of a large anywhere else, and a pretzel with salt. The pretzel was okay, but I wish there was some cheese sauce for it. Maybe I could have asked for some sauce from the nachos. The salt was a detriment and did not help the flavor. When I got up at the end of the match, I noticed a pile of salt under my seat that had fallen off it. I will endeavor to find something at the concession that I can get excited about.
I picked the Aggie end of the court to sit at, since all the seats were general admission, though I knew they’d change sides during the match. I can see the coach and the girls below my perch. I’d seen their game on Thursday on TV. It was an exciting five set match that ended in an Aggie victory. Adam Young, the Aggie announcer I think for everything except Men’s basketball and football, talked to coach Mike Jordan afterward. (I didn’t write down his name when he was announced at the match, assuming it was in the program. It wasn’t. I found it in a newspaper clipping on Sunday. Whoever does the programs, you need to put the staff in too guys. The opponent’s coaches are listed.) Coach Jordan was unhappy that they didn’t put the match away earlier when they could have. I get the impression this coach is always unhappy. He seems like a dad with 18 daughters, that he loves to death and is very proud of, but they drive him crazy all of the time.
I think Adam was broadcasting over the Internet as audio only, since I didn’t see a lot of cameras. He was holding a card most of the time, which I’d guess had the player rosters on it. I could see the PA guy at the other end of the table. I don’t know his name, but he has a great voice. About half of the cheerleading squad was there. This time the guys were with them; they weren’t there Thursday. They’d hold up the standing girls with one hand, over their heads. (This is what the soccer match needed, cheerleaders.) Pistol Pete was in the house.
The crowd was kind of small for the venue (that hosts concerts and men’s basketball), but decent. I didn’t feel lonely, and they could get loud supporting the team. Previous match attendance figures listed in the program for this year go from 0 to 1,500 with double and triple digit numbers in between. Thursday’s number was 1,100. Maybe today was 900. They were a fairly diverse bunch of families, kids, older people, and a few students. There were four rambunctious little boys behind me with a mother that was surely contemplating Ritalin for them. (It was just like the football game. I wonder if they were the same kids.)
After warming up and visiting the locker room, the girls charged back out on to the court. They danced around cheering in two, counter-rotating circles to a slightly updated version of the 50’s classic “You Don’t Own Me.” I love this. Their opponent, the Utah Valley Wolverines, also have a spirited cheer on their end of the court. The starters line up on court and the Wolverines are introduced. The lights go out and its showtime. The Aggie girls were each introduced with a spotlight. Each of them had a ball, which I think was a t-shirt in a wad, and they threw it into the crowd as they’re called out. Okay, in brutal honesty, none of these girls would make the softball team. #20 Sasha-Lee Thomas was smart enough to just run off court and hand hers to a little boy. The Aggie girls look great with their new white tops with crimson trim. Thanks, new Underarmor sponsorship. Like the soccer tops, I wouldn’t mind owning one.
Set 1
Utah Valley starts off the game with four straight points. I find myself checking the program to compare records: NMSU 10-4, Utah Valley 4-10. I wasn’t expecting a walkover, but I was pretty sure the Aggies were better the rest of the conference. At 3-7 Wolverines, Coach Jordan calls an Aggie timeout and starts rimming the team. I can see why there aren’t any fan seats near the bench. I could almost hear him over the music and the PA. Jordan Abalos serves an ace to tie the score at 9-9. #6 Tatyana Battle scores a couple of kills to tie it again at 12-12.
Again, the Aggies fall behind 12-16 and there’s another Aggie timeout. This time the assistant coach talks to most of the team. Coach Jordan talks to a couple of individual players. They’re an interesting physical contrast to each other. The coach is a large, somewhat rotund, bald middle aged man, while the young man I’m tagging as the assistant is lean with short cropped hair and glasses. I list a couple of questionable calls on kill shots in my notes. UV goes on a streak and even with a bit of an Aggie comeback, the Wolverines take the set 18-25.
Set 2 UV 1-NMSU 0
The girls change sides, including the cheerleaders. There is a moment of deadly quiet during the Flex-cam before the music starts. This is why they keep it loud in an arena; large, cavernous spaces are hard to fill with noise and otherwise very quiet. The Aggies make a great start at 4-0 and run it up to 10-5. Wolverine #7 Nakisha Willden makes a couple of great saves, but they end up as Aggie points. UV makes a run and at 21-18, there’s an Aggie timeout. I notice the break music: .38 Special’s “So Caught Up in You.” From here on out, I’m enjoying the music. A pair of UV aces brings the score to 23-21, Tatyana and Sasha-Lee finish out the set with kills, 25-23 Aggies. I notice the program says Sasha-Lee is from Jamaica. I find myself wanting to hear her voice. There is a lot of chatter on the court in play that you don’t get over the TV.
Intermission (10 minutes)
Pistol Pete visits my section. He interacts with a couple girls and their mom. The boys behind me give Pete a hard a time, but he’s good with kids. There’s an air-guitar contest on court between two girls, one of whom was from England, but I missed it. Nature was calling and wanted that Dr. Pepper I’d drank. “Hey sexy lady!” We finish off the intermission Gangnam style. I felt like dancing, but didn’t. You’re welcome.
Set 3 UV 1-NMSU 1
At 2-3 UV a ball bounds into the stands behind the court and into the crowd. Heads up! 8-11 is a UV point, but #8 Kaylee Neal and #4 Ariadnne Sierra make great saves on it. I kept getting tickled when the PA would announce a girl named “Ari” coming into the game. (On a similar note, Aggie #13 Alexsa Parker went by the name, “Crash.” I’m sure there’s a story there.) 9-13 the Aggies serve it into the net two times in a row. That has to drive the coach crazy. The Spanish version of “Call me maybe” plays over a timeout. 11-17 is a highly contested point that goes to UV. The Aggies almost net another serve, but it just gets over, and they get the point, 13-17. 16-18 is another epic point, but this one goes to the Aggies. I wish I had a touch count on some of these points. I’m working up a sweat just watching. We’re “Getting jiggy with it” during a timeout. #14 Kassandra Tohm got her legs rubbed down behind the bench, maybe from cramps. #1 Brianna Ainsworth scores an ace to bring it to 19-20. The Aggies would even the score, but the Wolverines would end up taking the set 23-25.
Set 4 UV 2-NMSU 1
With Ari serving, the Aggies rolling off six straight points, 8-3 Aggies. She also gets a great dig off of a dive to keep a point going. #12 Megan Hart gets a couple of kills to drive it up to 14-5. She doesn’t jump well, perhaps owing to the brace on her knee, but at 6’5” I saw her spike the ball just standing. I’d also seen her several times at the ballpark in the spring with a much shorter teammate, both wearing volleyball shirts. They stood out in the crowd and not to mention they’re also nice-looking. Hey, I’m here supporting your team too.
A procedural call gives the Aggies a point and UV takes a timeout. “Return of the Mac” plays and “There it is!” The Wolverines go on a pair of short runs, but Jordan has a hand in stopping both. Ari serves up the final three points and the Aggies take the set 25-15. I didn’t write this down until the end of my notes, but this was where the Wolverines lost their composure. They clearly got frustrated here.
Set 5 UV 2-NMSU 2
We go to 15 in the final set (but have to win by two). I learned that from watching on Thursday, when the match suddenly ended before I thought it would. The girls didn’t change ends for the start of the set. “Is it too late to say sorry now,” I see one of the UV girls dancing to the Justin Bieber song. A cameraman and director are on court picking out people in the crowd dancing. On the other side of the court, Brianna is waving her arms getting warmed up and accidentally hits Ari on the nose. No harm done, but Bri is mortified by the friendly fire.
The Wolverines have recovered from the last set and taken a slim lead, 3-4, as Jordan hits a kill into the net. At 3-5, timeout Aggies. Kenny Loggins’ “I’m alright,” plays, but things aren’t alright. The Aggies lose a long point and go down 3-7. Timeout. The Outfield’s baseball staple “Use your love” is played. The Wolverines serve an out, 4-7. There’s a Wolverine error, 5-7. On the next point, the UV bench is in an uproar. There’s an awkward hit at the net by an Aggie that might have been a carry or double hit, but the official standing right next to it didn’t see it that way, 6-7.
At 6-8 the teams change ends. “They call me Jane! That’s not my name!” I don’t know who does that song, but I like it. 6-9 as Jordan hits a kill out of bounds, and then there’s an ace. Jordan doesn’t change her game here and continues to hit it hard. She gets two kills in a row to bring it to 9-10. Timeout Utah Valley.
“I’ve got the power!” and “Should I stay or should I go” play. A spontaneous “Go Aggies” shout comes up from the crowd. One of the Aggie girls starts skipping rope to stay warmed up. There’s a moment of absolute quiet as the Wolverines score twice, but again Jordan gets a kill to bring it to 10-12. She gets another, 12-13. Ari makes a great dig and Tatyana finishes the point, 13-13. Timeout UV. Blue Oyster Cult, “Don’t fear the reaper.” Tatyana gets another kill, 15-14, and set point. Ari serves and makes another great save. Aggies win the point, the set (16-14), and the match (3-2). Everyone in the arena is exhausted by the end, but it’s a happy kind of tired for the Aggies and Aggie fans. Hall and Oates, “You make my dreams come true,” plays us out.
I don’t fault the Wolverines for losing. It could have gone either way at the end of the fifth set, but it wasn’t luck. If Utah Valley got frustrated, it was because they were outplaying the Aggies, but they weren’t beating them. The Aggies weren’t folding in spite of their opponent’s successes and their own mistakes. Today, they were able to keep their focus and confidence, regardless of the circumstances. This was so clear in the final set when the Aggies were down, but didn’t stop being aggressive. “You don’t own me,” indeed.
For the Wolverines, #17 Lexi Thompson lead the offense with 18 kills. Nobody else on the team was close. I was impressed with #7 Nakisha Wilden, their captain. (She's the "libero," a designated defenisve player wearing a different colored top. I learned this from Wikipedia five minutes before I posted this. I assumed she wasn't their goalie.) I don’t have statistics on digs, but she made great save after great save in the backcourt.
I went in thinking Aggie #3 Jordan Abalos was a star and she did not disappoint. Jordan was the spear point of the Aggie offense with the most kills, 22. (Sasha-Lee and Tatyana were also in double digits.) She came up big late in the fifth with four kills (don’t hold me to that number). The way she looks, acts, and plays on the court, Jordan naturally falls into a starring role. (Now I really want that poster, but I suspect they’re long gone.)
My player of the game is Aggie # 4 Ariadnne Sierra, Aggie libero (is there a cooler nickname for that?). She was constantly and consistently making saves and digs in the back. It was on her serve in the fourth set that the Aggies went on their biggest run of the match, and her second service turn finished that set. This was when the Wolverines became flustered. In the fifth, Ari was again serving at the end and made a tremendous save on the final point. Her prominent presence in these big moments wasn’t a coincidence. She was one of the smallest girls out there, but Ari had a stature you couldn’t measure in inches out on the court. It also didn’t hurt that I saw Ari signing autographs for a couple of little girls after the match. (I’m sure the other girls would sign too, of course.)
Thank goodness the Aggies won. I thought I’d heard on the TV broadcast that they had a conference winning streak on their home court. I didn’t want to be a jinx and have to apologize to the team afterward and get yelled at by the coach. I am damn pleased with how I spent my afternoon. I saw a great match and got some swag in the process. I definitely have plans to make it back over during my vacation next week and to tell everyone what a great time I had at Aggie Volleyball.
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