Seattle Times: Rowland looking to get back in sync (Terry Wood)

NOTE: Space restrictions shortened the UW volleyball story that appears in today’s Seattle Times.  Below is the same story with some additional information.

Washington looks for volleyball sweep against visiting Colorado, Utah

Senior middle blocker Bianca Rowland and setter Evan Sanders, a transfer from Colorado State, have looked out of sync for Huskies.

BY TERRY WOOD

Special to The Seattle Times

When the third-ranked Washington volleyball team hosts two Pac-12 bottom-dwellers this weekend (Colorado on Friday, Utah on Saturday, both at Edmundson Pavilion at 7 p.m.), likely the only real drama in store will be this: Can Bianca Rowland get untracked?

UW’s senior middle blocker and co-captain, who in 2010 ranked eighth nationally in hitting percentage (.409) and was named an honorable mention All-American for the second straight year, is hitting a modest .287 this year and is not in the top 100.

“We’ve got to fix Bianca’s deal,” coach Jim McLaughlin said after last Saturday’s sweep of Oregon State, when Rowland hit just .083 (seven kills and five errors on 24 attacks). In six conference matches, she has hit above .200 just twice.

Rowland and setter Evan Sanders, a senior transfer from Colorado State playing her first season at UW, at times look out of sync. Rowland seems to reach Sanders’ sets early or late and often resorts to tipping balls rather than hammering them.

Solving the issue “is a dual responsibility,” McLaughlin says.

Bianca Rowland (15) and Evan Sanders (10) celebrate a Rowland kill against Oregon State
[Volleyblog Seattle photo by Leslie Hamann]

“Bianca has got to be in the right place at the right time, and Evan has got to set the ball with great consistency,” he said “She almost has to institutionalize the set. Then they can connect on the thing.

“Every play has a different rhythm,” he said, “so you’ve got to adjust to the rhythm of the play and be in the right place relative to the contact point. I don’t think B (Rowland) was doing that, and Evan wasn’t giving her the same set all the time.



“It’s like an end running a pattern that the quarterback doesn’t know about, so it influences the throw. You can’t have that. It’s got to be very deliberate. They both have got to do their jobs. Together they can make the thing work.”

Meanwhile, fellow middle blocker Lauren Barfield is hitting .345 and having her best year since she became a regular in 2009. Barfield’s rotation, McLaughlin explains, usually positions her in front of Sanders.

“Evan is really good at setting those balls,” he said. “Bianca has a lot more movement to her position. She’s in what we call the M1, and she’s moving into different gaps for every hit.

“She’s been very good in front of the setter, but we’ve got to work on the movement behind,” he said. “Both of them are screwing it up. Whenever there’s uncertainty, it’s uncomfortable for everyone.”

Rowland says making a good connection is a work in progress. “It’s something we’re both conscious of,” she said. “We’ve just got to keep working on it and straighten it out before (postseason play in) December comes.

Are Sanders’ sets too high? “I’d rather have them too high than too low,” Rowland said. “It’s timing. I’m not going to put it on her or me. I’ve got to keep hitting my shot and hopefully Evan and I will connect sooner rather than later.”

Sanders says McLaughlin and his assistants continually fine-tune her technique in practice. “They’re always, constantly pushing me, but they’re also building my confidence,” she said.

“The coaches are amazing here. It’s just (a matter of) me having higher expectations of myself and believing I can be the great setter they believe I can be.”

Does all the prodding discourage her? “No, not at all,” she said. “If the coaches don’t have expectations for you, there’s no room for you to get better. So I want them to believe that I can be a great setter. If they didn’t believe in me, that would be more discouraging than them pushing me every day and telling me that I can be great.”

Sanders knows McLaughlin is a fan of quick sets for middles. “Our quick is an area we want to improve, just so we have balance in the front row and can go to any of our hitters,” she said. “The quick is primarily coming from my end. Our middles are great. They’re working on things, and Jenni (Nogueras, a sophomore setter) and I are working on things. We’re making improvements.”

Notes: UW (13-1, 5-1 Pac-12) has 12 sweeps this season, including their last five matches. Utah (6-10, 1-6) picked up its only conference win against Colorado (5-10, 0-7) on Sept. 13 in Boulder.

As a team, the Huskies rank fifth nationally in hitting percentage (.290) and second in blocks per set (3.22). Individually, Rowland ranks 12th and Barfield 14th in blocks per set.

http://volleyblogseattle.blogspot.com/2011/10/special-report-why-fewer-women-are.html