Following a 3-0 loss to Oklahoma in their home opener on Tuesday, the Wildcats (3-6) head to Fort Worth for the TCU Tournament on Friday and Saturday.
ACU is 1-4 in their last five after a tough Oral Roberts Tournament over the weekend and a difficult 3-0 loss to Oklahoma on Tuesday. Now the Wildcats look to bounce back in the TCU Tournament starting against Texas State at 4 p.m. on Friday. Blair said she’s looking to seeing a more complete performance from her Wildcats.
“Definitely confidence but also sticking to our game plan,” Blair said. “I thought we let OU control the court a majority of the time but we did have spurts where we were seeing ACU volleyball.”
On the year, Texas State is 6-3 with wins over familiar ACU foes Houston Baptist, Incarnate Word and Sam Houston. In the Bobcat Invitational last weekend, the Bobcats won two out of three with 3-0 sweeps over Sam Houston and Wake Forest but a 3-1 loss to Ole Miss. Texas State is hitting .234 to their opponents’ .175 and averaging 16.3 digs per set to their opponents’ 14.5.
TCU is 3-5 with their lone wins coming over Coastal Carolina, Western Carolina and Indiana. In their opening weekend, they faced the No. 3 Wisconsin Badgers and No. 5 Minnesota Golden Gophers dropping both 3-0. It has not been an easy slate for the Horned Frogs as they are hitting at .197 to their opponents’ .248 and averaging 1.5 blocks per set to their opponents’ 2.3.
Louisiana is 4-3 with wins over Eastern Michigan, Fairfield, North Dakota State and UTSA. The Ragin Cajuns won two out of four in the Sawyer Camillo Memorial Classic, winning over NDSU and UTSA and losing 3-1 to both UTRGV and Texas A&M. As a team, they are hitting at a .207 clip to their opponents’ .197 and 11.7 assists per set their opponents’ 10.9.
“We have to have more confidence and apply pressure at the service line,” Blair said. “If we keep TCU out of system, we’ll have a little more success defensively. We have to be really diligent in our service game and our passing game.”
Blair’s Wildcats are hitting at a .150 percentage right now to their opponents’ .228. ACU is also averaging 10.6 assists per set to their opponents’ 12.3. For the Wildcats to remain competitive this weekend, they must improve their offensive efficiency. One of the standouts for Blair has been middle blocker Braden Bossier, junior from Fairfield, who leads all Wildcats with 24 blocks and had six kills against OU on Tuesday night.
“What we can take from this match is to go out and play with confidence,” Bossier said. “I think we lacked confidence today and played a little timid. For this weekend, we have to have a mindset of, ‘We are attackers and we will win this game.’”
The Wildcats begin against Texas State at 4 p.m. on Friday and take on TCU at 11 a.m. and Louisiana at 3:30 p.m. on Saturday at Schollmaier Arena.
