By Curtis Stone
Our women’s volleyball team ended their season ranked #3 in their conference, which might not have been the conference championship they had hoped for, but over the whole season they experienced many highs, and maybe a few lows. Since my fiancé played on the team, I decided to take a few stats of the team week by week and track their progress. The results I found were pretty interesting and I’d like to share some of the highlights of the season with you all.
For a little bit of context, every team in division III volleyball is ranked based on their statistics in fifteen categories on a team level, and sixteen categories on an individual basis. The statistics from each team is pitted against the other 435 teams in division III. Statistically, if our team is ranked below the 218 mark, we would be in the top half of the national rankings. Now, not every single one of our team’s stats would be in the top half at the start of the season. In fact, seven different categories would be below that mark. The girls worked hard throughout the season to push that number down to three.
The volleyball team in their opening two weekends managed to play nine games, winning three of them. Now, not every team can start the season off batting a thousand, and this first weekend gave the players a good opportunity to see what they could do well, and what they possibly needed to focus on a little bit more. Those seven different categories that ranked the team in the lower 50%? Those categories were aces per set, assists per set, digs per set, hitting percentage, kills per set, match win-loss percentage, and team attacks per set. If you don’t play or watch volleyball, you will probably have no idea what those mean, but since I do, I can try and explain that to you. Basically, the team ranked in the lower 50% for every single statistic that scored them a point, and points are how you win a game. During those two weekends, however, there was a single area scoring them more points, and ranking them higher in the nation than any other statistic. That was their blocking. Led by a freshman middle who was 44th in the nation for blocks per set, the team was ranked 72nd for blocks per set and 52nd for total blocks. Those kinds of numbers put them in nearly the top 15% of all 435 division III.
Unfortunately, not all good things could last. The team stayed in the top 15% for their blocks per set until the week of Oct 10th. The next few weeks the team started to struggle more with their blocking, dropping them from 61st in the nation to a low of 142nd on the weekend of Nov 7th. The team’s total blocks ranking, however, didn’t struggle at all, reaching a high of 62nd in the nation on Sep 26th, and continuing to improve from there. In fact, every team total statistic for the team dramatically began to improve as the season went on. The team started off 190th for total assists, and ended 50th, 146th for total digs to 15th, 170th for total kills to 31st, 121st for total aces to 24th, 157th for total attacks to 14th, and finally finished in 14th for total blocks. These kinds of numbers mean that our women’s volleyball team was in the top 7% for all but one of these categories. . .IN THE NATION. Among 435 total teams we managed to be that high, which I find very impressive.
You might be asking yourself why or how did the team manage to do so well in the total numbers, but not as well in the other categories? Well, the volleyball team, while also playing more games than a fair majority of the nation, decided that they loved to go to five sets. Now in a volleyball game you play the best of five sets, each set ending when one team has scored 25 points. Most games are over when one team wins three sets straight and scores a total of 75 points. However, if teams decide to trade sets and they both win two, the game goes to a fifth set which is won at 15 points instead of 25. In that case, a winning team will earn a minimum of 65 total points if they manage to not score a single time in the sets that they lost. In a three set win, you would average 25 points per set, but in a five set win you could average anywhere from 13 points per set to well over 25 points per set. So in a five set match you have many many more opportunities to score total points, which is why our women’s team had such impressive rankings in the total categories. They decided to play more than three sets in 17 of their 31 total games, and averaged 88.6 points a game, much more than a normal three set victory.
So now the question is how did the team do in all of their ‘per set’ national rankings? There are seven total ‘per set’ statistics that we look at. Those are aces per set, assists per set, blocks per set, digs per set, kills per set, hitting percentage, and opponent hitting percentage. After that first weekend, the only categories that they were ranked in the top 50% were blocks per set at 72nd and opponent hitting percentage at 163rd. Every other statistic was in the bottom 50% of the nation with their assists per set being ranked 308th or the bottom 30% of the nation. That first weekend showed that they had a lot of work to do. And work they did. By Oct 10th they had pulled one of those up into the top 50% percentile. Aces per set had jumped down to 185th, while blocks per set was maintained at 106th, and opponent hitting percentage was at 159th. Working against 435 other teams is not an easy task. One good weekend for the team wasn’t going to immediately pull them up from the bottom when everyone else is also trying to improve on their record and their numbers. The week of Oct 31st was the next time they were able to bring a statistic out of the lower 50% when digs per set was ranked 188th. Finally, kills per set was ranked 217th and barely in the top 50% in their last week playing together. Overall, aces per set finished at 139th, assists per set at 259th, blocks per set at 137th, digs per set at 153rd, kills per set at 217th, hitting percentage at 221st, and opponent hitting percentage at 107th.
The girls on the women’s volleyball team might not have had the outcome for their season that they had hoped, but all in all they got better. They started the season off with some less than spectacular play and after everything was said and done, improved in nearly every single category they could. Their hard work in practice and dedication in the weight room clearly showed on the court as they tried to better themselves every single week.
If you want to see the original statistics:
Women’s Volleyball: A Season Recap was originally published in The Herald on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.