Sophomore outside hitter Jurnee Robinson threw the ball upward, ready to serve it.
As she pulled her arm back and placed all her energy into getting it over the net, she channeled everything she had into this hit. Her hand made contact with the ball, and the noise that came from it bounced off the walls of the arena.
The ball flew over the net and past the opposite team’s players, avoiding every attempt they made it to block it.
It hit the floor and the crowd cheered, but not for the Tigers.
“Out of bounds. Point, Texas!”
It was that kind of night as the Tigers were swept by the defending national champion Texas Longhorns.
On Sunday afternoon, LSU celebrated 50 years of LSU volleyball as they played the Texas Longhorns for their second SEC match of the season.
Coming off two straight losses to San Diego and Missouri, it was important for LSU to turn things around this game, especially since it was playing in front of an attendance record-breaking crowd of 3,885 people, including at least 60 LSU volleyball alumni.
Texas on the other hand, entered the PMAC with a winning streak of three after going against Baylor, Hawaii and their first SEC opponent, Texas A&M.
The Longhorns took immediate control in set one with two points after a kill by senior outside hitter Madisen Skinner and an attack error from LSU’s freshman middle blocker Jessica Jones.
While errors are a common part of volleyball, they’re especially familiar to LSU volleyball, being something that the team has struggled with over the last few games.
“At the end of the day when you look at the box score, it’s the team that made the least amount of errors that wins the matches, and that was the case today as well,” head coach Tonya Johnson said.
The box score after the match reported that Texas had 10 attack errors whereas LSU had 20, seven of those occurring during the first set alone. Robinson was responsible for four of those errors and the rest were scattered between her teammates.
However, she still led the match in kills with 17. Trailing behind her was sophomore middle blocker Angelina Lee with seven and freshman outside hitter Lainee Pyles with five.
“Jurnee had a really good night hitting against their big physicality blockers,” Johnson said.
While several of Robinson’s kills were made in the first set of the game, it wasn’t enough for the Tigers to outrun the Longhorns and they lost the first set, 25-20.
It was already a struggle to keep up with Texas before, but moving into the second set LSU found their confidence rattled as they sat on the losing end of a nine-point deficit, 12-3.
“That’s the part we have to get better at,” Johnson said. “Making sure teams don’t go five- and six-point runs on us.”
Competing against redshirt sophomore middle blocker Marianna Singletary, who ranks No. 38 in the NCAA in blocks per set, proved to be very difficult for LSU as they lost the second set, 25-20.
The third set could have changed everything for LSU as they got a head start against Texas and found themselves tied with Texas several times.
However, the team continued to struggle against the Longhorns, although graduate setter Bailey Ortega wouldn’t call it struggling.
“I think for us it was more so just playing our game and having fun,” she said.
Ortega finished the match with two kills, eight digs, 26 assists and one block, yet LSU eventually lost set three to Texas, 25-15.
All three of these set losses gave Texas the win in a sweep, dragging LSU behind them.
Texas being able to take the advantage throughout the match didn’t serve as much of a surprise, given that they rank No. 6 in the SEC in hitting percentage as well No. 11 in kills, both categories that LSU trails behind in.
“I thought we did a lot of things well, but obviously not well not enough to win the match,” Johnson said.
After this match, LSU has realized there is certainly a lot to learn moving forward.
“I wanna keep working on defense and keep putting my hitters in better positions,” Ortega said.
Given that this loss has added to their losing streak, how likely is it that LSU volleyball will turn things around for themselves?
If LSU can take away anything from this match, it’s to keep working on errors and figuring out how to maintain their confidence over the course of the game. If that doesn’t work, then things won’t look good for the Tigers next Friday as they take on Mississippi State.
