The Arizona Wildcats ended last week with a dominant sweep of No. 13 TCU. They started this week with a tight win over No. 21 BYU. The close 3-1 (26-24, 21-25, 25-22, 26-24) victory may be a bigger deal.
Some might call the teams inconsistent. There’s a valid argument to be made for that, but there’s also an argument that quality teams are going to force opponents into some level of inconsistency. Two quality teams are going to rise to the occasion at different times during the ebbs and flows of the match. If Arizona is to be considered one of those quality teams, it must be able to withstand those ebbs and flows. On Wednesday evening, it was.
“For me, it’s never about necessarily, the inconsistency or consistency as much as how we’re making the errors,” said Arizona head coach Rita Stubbs. “So if we’re making mindless errors, you know, trying to hit balls we shouldn’t hit, or not being in the right spot on defense or late as a blocker, those are the things that I focus more on versus the mistakes. Because mistakes are normal and the better team that you play, the more they force you to make mistakes.”
The Wildcats had slow starts in three of the four sets. They fell behind by at least three points early in the first, second, and fourth sets. In the third, the lull came mid-set. They closed the gap on each occasion overcame often enough to close out the match in four sets. With the slow starts, a fifth set might have been disastrous.
In the past, it has often been the Wildcats who have let things get away from them late in sets. They let leads slip away. A close set becomes a loss by five or more. There have been fewer of those occasions this year, suggesting the program and the players are moving in the right direction.
“We’re talking a lot about being a team and trusting one another,” Stubbs said.
The victory marked Arizona’s second straight win over a ranked opponent and the third win over a ranked opponent this season. It had two ranked wins last season, defeating BYU and Kansas in McKale Center.
The last time the Wildcats had two straight wins against a ranked team was the 2020 season, which was shifted to spring of 2021 and altered due to the pandemic. They beat Stanford in back-to-back matches played in McKale Center on Feb. 5 and Feb. 7, 2021. However, the Cardinal were at an extreme disadvantage due to the pandemic rules in Santa Clara County and were very shorthanded. Arizona also beat Washington State that year, giving the Wildcats three ranked wins, albeit under unusual circumstances.
The last time Arizona had back-to-back ranked wins or more than two ranked wins in a standard season was 2016. The Wildcats did it twice that season.
The first was a streak of three ranked wins against No. 22 USC, No. 18 UCLA, and No. 12 Stanford between Oct. 1 and Oct 9, 2016. UA repeated the feat on Nov. 2 against No. 25 USC and Nov. 4 against No. 9 UCLA. The Wildcats ended that year in the Sweet Sixteen, where they were dismissed by fellow Pac-12 team Washington.
The two-match winning streak not only made up for spots lost after the disappointing loss to Texas Tech on Oct. 29, it has pushed the Wildcats to their highest RPI rank of the season. While the official RPI will not be out until next week, the unofficial RPI has Arizona at No. 35 after the win. The team had fallen to No. 57 in the unofficial RPI following the loss to TTU, then moved back up to No. 49 in the official RPI after beating TCU. The victory over No. 16 BYU pushed it up 14 spots.
The win also put Arizona in a tie with Baylor for fifth in the Big 12 standings at 7-5. The Wildcats defeated the Bears head-to-head in their only meeting this season.
It’s not just about RPI rankings and conference standings, though. It’s also about keeping people coming back.
“I really think that we’ve just been trying to keep a level headed mindset and knowing that we are better than what we had showcased in those…previous games that we had lost,” said Arizona senior Jordan Wilson. “And so I think we really kind of took that, not personally, but to heart, and knowing that we could showcase so much better what we have to our fans… and so I really think that we just use those games, kind of turned into a positive mindset, and use that as drive, or just to kind of tell ourselves, like, hey, we can’t be at that level again. We are a lot better than that.”
Wilson led the Wildcats on offense. She had a match-hit 24 kills. She also came up big on defense with nine digs and four total blocks. She contributed 26 points.
Wilson did have her struggles, though. As usual, they came in serve receive.
Arizona was aced 10 times. Wilson had four of the reception errors, but her 31 targets tied BYU libero Lulu Uluave for the match high. Carlie Cisneros was second on the Wildcats with 27 receptions, tying BYU outside hitter Suli Davis.
Wilson definitely wasn’t the only one who struggled on serve receive. Defensive specialist Haven Wray was second on the team with three reception errors in just eight receptions. Even when BYU was not getting service aces, Arizona had long stretches where the team as a whole struggled to stay in system. It allowed the Cougars to go on several runs.
Up Next for Arizona Volleyball
Texas Tech (10-13, 2-9) @ Arizona Wildcats (13-9, 7-5)
When: Friday, Nov. 7 at 11 a.m. MST
Where: McKale Center in Tucson, Ariz.
Streaming: ESPN+
Stats: Arizona Live Stats
Arizona responded on defense. The Wildcats’ blocking overwhelmed BYU. UA had 12 total blocks. The middle blockers came up big with Adrianna Bridges getting a match-high six total blocks and Journey Tucker finishing with five, but the Wildcats would not have been as successful without freshman opposite Renee Jones, who .
“It’s wonderful just to be able to help my team as much as possible, and just be able to be out there and knowing that they have faith in me to perform as well as I can,” Jones said.
Jones made her second straight start. She accounted for nine kills on .300 hitting and four total blocks. One of those blocks was solo. It was also the freshman who put the match away with the final kill.
“She’s been getting so many good swings,” Wilson said. “There’s times on the court where I find myself saying, ‘Set Renee! Set Renee!’ just because she’s on fire and she knows where to put the ball. The other teams just haven’t really figured out…how to defend her.”
Jones was in position for the final kill because of the serving of Cisneros. Cisneros received BYU’s serve 27 times. She also served the ball a team-high 27 times with one ace.
An ace by setter Avery Scoggins got Arizona its first match point at 24-23. BYU wiped that away but followed with a hitting error to give the Wildcats another one. Cisneros was up.
She stepped to the line thinking, “Let’s get them out of system so we can get a free ball back and score.”
They didn’t get the free ball. In fact, at one point in the final rally, they had to send the free ball over to BYU. But the defense held strong, as it had all night. Eventually, the big swing by Jones sent the ball flying off the hands of the Cougars defender and bouncing into the south stands of McKale Center.
Cisneros’ night at the service line wasn’t her only impact. The sophomore outside hitter had a double-double with 10 kills and 20 digs. The digs tied her career high set at Houston earlier this season. She credited her teammates.
“They definitely were because of the block,” Cisneros said. “They were getting great touches. I was just reading back there. They made my life super easy.”
Now, Arizona needs to do something it couldn’t last week: beat Texas Tech. As Stubbs noted earlier this week, there is no way to make up for the loss. It’s not going away. The Wildcats just need to make sure it doesn’t happen again. To do that, their mindset must be right.
“For me, that’s a matter of just staying focused and doing our job, not trying to say, ‘Oh, I got to
prove to you what I can do,’“ Stubbs said.
