NM State Aggies vs Utah Valley Wolverines Volleyball 11-6-21 Part 1

 

Big news in Aggie Land this week, NMSU will join Conference-USA in 2023.  I’d mentioned this possibility a couple of weeks ago (10-23-21).  They’d gone from 14 members to five members in a week.  By this week, they were down to three and couldn’t be choosey.  The good news is that the football program will finally have a home.  The bad news is that most of the other teams in the conference are in the Eastern Time zone.  UTEP, the only western team in the conference, can attest to the difficulty of playing back East; they’re winless in football in over 20 attempts and their basketball program hasn’t mattered since the move.

 

This brings up another issue.  For whatever reason, UTEP does not seem to want to be in the same conference with NMSU.  Both programs have wanted to get into the Mountain West Conference.  UTEP had begged them for membership when the C-USA exodus started.  UTEP’s football team has had enough of a resurgence this season that they’re probably hoping to convince them to change their minds.  UTEP might appreciate having an opponent in the same time zone, but will more likely try to leave before 2023.  (At least, John Tischer, calling UTEP Football that night, was excited about it.  He suggested their annual conference game be set for Thanksgiving week every year.  It’d be nice for the teams to not have to travel over the holiday.) 

 

I’m questioning the viability of the conference altogether.  Their TV and bowl deals may go down the drain with their new membership.  NMSU is glad to not have to scramble for football opponents now, but they had to leave the WAC in all sports to make the deal.  I know they didn’t like being in two conferences before (the WAC and the Sunbelt, and who would have figured them as a winner in all these conference musical chairs?), but now the crown jewel of the Men’s Basketball program is going to have to figure out a new conference.  The other new members might not be that great, so the Aggies could be very competitive, but there’s that time zone difference thing again.  The Miners haven’t really been competitive in basketball since they joined the conference.  Regardless, this was an opportunity NMSU couldn’t pass on.

 

For here and now, Aggie Football was cross-scheduled at home with the Volleyball which me and Ron were coming for.  I thought for sure that volleyball would be rescheduled to earlier in the morning, but I’m not in charge.  I’m not actually sure how much crossover there is between the fans of the sports.  I don’t know about football attendance, but volleyball was about normal.  The Aggie Pride Band and the Flag Corps were practicing outside of the Pan-Am Center when we got there.

 

The Volleyball team went one-and-three on their long road trip.  They won at home on Thursday against Dixie State in straight sets.  I wasn’t able to listen to all of the game, but I noticed Cat Kelly did well and played a lot.  I didn’t realize, until Ron told me, that one of the regular starter girls was out for testing positive.  That turned out to be Lindsay Blakey.  Later that night, Cal Baptist lost to Chicago State, who are not a joke this year, so that helped the Aggies in the standings.  (They may be tied with GCU for the division lead.) 

 

(One quick other recap notice, Aggie Soccer’s season came to an end in the first round of the WAC Tournament.  They heartbreakingly lost to Lamar 1-0.  From the account, the Aggies peppered the Lamar goalie with twice the number of shots as theirs, but couldn’t get any of them into the net.  It was still an encouraging season.  Surprisingly, the games were being played in Abilene, and not at GCU in Phoenix.)

 

When I bought my ticket, a large, nice-looking family came in after me.  They were apparently with Utah Valley.  (Tickets were $5.  I cannot figure out why the price keeps going up and down on conference games.)  They sat behind the team across the court from us.  They didn’t wear the mandatory masks as demanded by our beloved governor.  The Aggie fans around them also discarded them.  The rest of us compliant dummies kept them on, regardless of how unscientific they are.  Pan-Am staff was short-handed because of the football game going on, so there weren’t any attendants walking up and down the aisles with mask signs. 

 

Out on court, Shaney Lipscomb wasn’t warming up with the team.  She was working out on an exercise bike with a jacket on and her left knee bandaged, but she looked like she’d be playing.  Lia Mosher was stretching on the floor and not working out with the team.  I was a bit concerned, since the Aggie bench was short.  The two girls did play a little one-on-one basketball with a volleyball against each other before the match, so they were okay to play.  Ron watched the Wolverines and scouted the team.  He thought they were pretty tall.  They also danced around to I Love It by Icona Pop over the PA.   

 

The crowd was pretty good.  A couple of middle school girl volleyball teams came in to watch.  The video board showed a couple of commercials for Jersey Mike’s subs.  Neither Ron nor I knew there was a Jersey Mike’s in town.  A quick search on Ron’s phone though, showed there wasn’t.  What a tease!  The subs looked so good, we were making lunch plans. 

 

There was some crowd singing along with the Anthem.  It was a bit of a poor chorus, but patriotic.  I don’t know if people wearing masks encouraged the singing (since you couldn’t see who was singing) or muffled it.  The Utah Valley team (hereafter designated UV) was their own cheering section and they were loud.  During player introductions, they jauntily waved to the crowd, like they forgot where they were.  There was another new team video.  It was okay.  Regular PA, Ed Carnathan, was at the football game, but his replacement (whose name I haven’t been able to catch), did an impersonation of him calling out Lia “Mooooosher’s” name.  The up official had a friendly chat with one of the ball girls on the sidelines for a moment.  And with that, we were underway.

 

Set 1

Shaney started off the match on the bench.  After a long rally on the first point, Lia Mosher (without the vowel emphasis, it’s not as impressive) started the set off with a whiff at the net.  It was an inauspicious beginning.  This was followed by Cat getting blocked, Katie Birtcil getting blocked, and pair of overpass kills by UV.  Just like that, it was 0-5 Wolverines.  Umm . . . Timeout Aggies. 

 

I was watching from across the court with his back turned, but Coach Jordan seemed fairly calm talking to the girls.  However, it was Shaney who seemed to do all the yelling when her teammates went back out on court, “Come on!  Get your heads in the game!  Let’s go!”  Okay, this is something I’ve wanted to see with this team, player leadership.  It doesn’t have to take the form of yelling and screaming, but somebody on the team needs to set the example and motivate her teammates.  It’s a little thing, but it’s what makes a talented team great.

 

Coach Jordan might have offered up something more practical, though, in his talk.  Katie dropped in a tip shot for the first Aggie point, instead of trying to get past the blocking.  2-6 Lia dunked one and Shaney came in.  I didn’t realize at the time that the seven starting players were going to be pretty much all of the rotation for the match.  3-7 Katie got a conventional kill.  4-8 Shaney got her first kill getting a touch on a crosscourt shot.  5-8 Cat kept the UV blockers honest with another tip.  6-8 Katie came flying in from the backcourt with a kill.  That’s becoming her signature shot. 

 

7-8 Shaney powered one down the line.  8-9 Cat came up with a kill.  She was all smiles afterward.  I think she was glad to getting more playing time.  9-10 Lia made her move with what I call, the Bearpaw.  10-10 Katie and Lia come up with a block to tie it.  The Aggies took the lead on the next point with an ace by setter, Carly Aigner-Swesey.  The PA kept pronouncing it, “Shwayzee.”  Hopefully, she wasn’t offended.  12-11 Cat painted the corner.  13-13 Lia with a slap kill.  14-13 Shaney on a block.  This is turning into a dogfight as the teams traded points.

 

16-16 Shaney pounded one into the pretty, small-looking blonde Wolverine libero, Bryton Bishop.  17-17 Carly improvised a dump shot on an overpass by Aggie libero, Darian Markham.  However, UV got out to a 17-20 lead on an ace.  Timeout Aggies.  At point, let me offer a small apology.  The action in this match was mostly furious enough that I had enough trouble just noting good Aggie plays.  Obviously, I’m pretty biased here in any case.  The Wolverines played well in the match, but I wasn’t able to note their most of their good plays. 

 

18-20 Katie came flying in from the backcourt, but tipped it for the kill.  19-20 a rare long rally in the match was terminated by Cat with a kill.  21-21 now the coach was screaming.  He was apparently trying to get a sub in to serve, but wasn’t allowed by the officials.  While the argument was going on, Cat went ahead and served and the Aggies took the point.  Lauryn Taylor then came in to serve.  22-21 Katie with another kill.  Timeout UV.  23-22 the Wolverines and Aggies kept trading points.  Katie got another kill here.  24-24 Mari Sharp saved a set point with a kill.  Finally though, Shaney was denied on a shot and the Wolverines took Set 1 in extra points, 24-26.

 

I went long in describing the conference situation.  Continued in Part 2