After a week of practice geared toward revamping the defense in time for Southeastern Conference play, coach Mary Wise said the payoff against Mississippi State on Friday was disappointing.
Despite the Gators (12-1, 1-0 SEC) sweeping the Bulldogs (9-6, 0-1 SEC) out of the Newell-Grissom Building in Starkville, Miss., in three straight sets (25-15, 25-21, 25-11), the defense of No. 3 Florida did not meet Wise’s expectations after allowing MSU to hit .310 and .229 in the first two sets, respectively.
“We just didn’t respond defensively,” she said. “We just didn’t make plays that we’re capable of. Uncharacteristic night for us. I felt very comfortable with what we’d be able to do in here and it just was an uncharacteristic performance.”
The poor first-contact hitting from the Gators’ back row directly affected Wise’s strategy to use more of middle blockers Chloe Mann and Simone Antwi, who combined for just 24 of Florida’s 106 swings on the night.
With Taylor Brauneis not being able to feed good passes from her defensive specialists to her middles, the pins on the outside had to step up their game to lead the UF offense.
“Fortunately, we had Gabby Mallette,” Wise said.
The sophomore outside hitter recorded a match-high 11 kills while committing just three errors, which helped Florida to a .330 hitting clip as a team for the night despite the passing game not performing up to standard.
“She got a lot of not great sets there . . . because we didn’t control the first contact,” Wise said. “Gabby carried us.”
While the Gators separated themselves from the Bulldogs in the third set by limiting MSU to just seven kills on 42 attacks, Wise said the improvement was coming from behind the service line if anything.
Florida finished on an 8-1 service ace advantage while also limiting its service errors to four, while the Bulldogs racked up six.
“In the third set, I think that was all behind the service line,” Wise said. “We had two great runs, one by Taylor and another one by Ziva (Recek) that really made the separation. We grinded our way through and rode behind the service line behind Ziva and Taylor.”
Follow Jonathan Czupryn on Twitter @jczupryn.
Gabby Mallette reaches to hit the ball during Florida’s four-set win against Western Michigan on Sept. 14 in the O’Connell Center.
