(Photo: Elijah Longoria)
On a day when Arizona State received its 2024 Big 12 Championship Ring, it welcomed Utah for its conference home opener after starting Big 12 play with a pair of wins on the road last week.
A 3-0 sweep (25-16, 25-15, 25-16) over Utah (8-7, 0-3 Big 12) served as a reminder that the Sun Devils have their eyes set on repeating that accomplishment.
Despite a sloppy start by its standards, No. 8 ASU (12-2, 3-0 Big 12) dominated the rest of the match behind clean execution and constant pressure to extend their win streak to six.
The Sun Devils began the first set slowly but closed out the frame on a 10-2 run, punctuated by a vicious spike from opposite hitter Noemie Glover. In that opening stretch of play, senior outside hitter Bailey Miller stepped up with four kills, vertically challenging the Utes’ defenders, especially when Glover was off the court.
Glover’s 4.59 kills per set would be good for 15th in the country, as this threat constantly opens up opportunities for the rest of ASU’s attackers.
“The automatic thing that teams are going to scout is that Noemi is our big hitter, so they’re probably going to put more of a block on her, and that’s probably going to slow her down a little bit more,” Miller said. “The middle and the outsides are able to step up, and I think that’s a great thing about our team.”
After committing five attack errors in the first, the Sun Devils tidied up their act to finish with just nine errors for the match while compiling 20 kills.
In the middle, setter Sydney Henry was ASU’s point guard, putting hitters on either side of her in positive positions. The senior has double-digit assists in every game this season and added 12 more to her tally today.
“I literally have weapons everywhere, whether Bailey’s in the back row, she’s in the front row, Colby (Neal), Ella (Lomigora), Noemi, KP, everyone’s a weapon,” Henry said. “It gives me the creativity to… really make them change their scheme.”
The Maroon and Gold were clinical in the second and third sets, but they were also heavily aided by Utah’s constant self-inflicted errors. Nearly 55% of ASU’s points came from Utes errors, compared to 41% vs Kansas State and 36.5% against Kansas last week.
Utah had 21 attack errors and 20 service errors, a fact Miller described as “bizarre”, but those mistakes arose from ASU’s initial aggressiveness.
“It’s really interesting because when you’re playing well, then your opponent feels more pressure, and so they press from the service line,” head coach JJ Van Niel said. “The last two years, we were such a good passing team; teams would usually miss more serves against us than other teams.”
Redshirt freshman Kiylah Presley added another element that defenses have to worry about with her explosive hitting opposite of Miller. Her five kills only trailed Glover (10) and Miller (9), and her athleticism off the wing was another option at Van Niel’s disposal.
ASU’s physicality also forced Utah to adjust from its regular offense. For most of the season, Utah came out in a 5-1, with a single setter operating between the front and back row.
Today, the Utes went into a 6-2, where the setter primarily goes into the back row and gets replaced by an opposite or outside hitter, to combat ASU’s size at the net.
ASU still won the battle up front, with three times as many blocks and seven more digs. Graduate middle blocker Colby Neal continued her excellent run of form with her fourth consecutive game of six total blocks.
The victory moved ASU to 12-2 on the year and 3-0 in Big 12 play, where the Sun Devils have lost just one match since the beginning of last season.
That one defeat? Baylor, which will enter a rocking Desert Financial Arena on Wednesday night.
“There’s definitely a chip on our shoulder, and it being at home, there’s a lot of motivation for us to come out swinging and come out ready to win,” Miller said. “So I think everybody, even if they weren’t here last year, (knows) what this game means to us.”
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