Still Streaking

At the start of the 2025 volleyball season, the UT Arlington program was coming off one of the best seasons in program history and by pure winning percentage, THE best season. At 29-3, UTA lost to two ranked teams and the American Athletic Conference's runner-up. At 16-0, it was the first undefeated conference run since 1992, and the only undefeated conference mark that played double-digit games in loop play.

One would have to go back to September 20th of last year to find the last regular season loss to this point in the 2025 season. Just FYI, between a funeral in California, a new work schedule and transcribing the interview with Athletic Director Jon Fagg, I just didn't have enough hours in the day to cover the first volleyball weekend tournament. So, I'll give my thoughts on it here.

I mentioned in the preseason poll post that the first Mav opponents weren't world-beaters. Quinnipiac was rated highly in Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference, which isn't a powerhouse league by any stretch (third worst overall conference last year). Western Illinois was picked sixth in the Ohio Valley. The OVC is only rated a few spots higher. Host Bradley's predicted finish in the Missouri Valley isn't available as the conference didn't publish its full list.

Conversation with an AD Part Four - Sports Quick Hits

The first three parts of my sit-down interview with UT Arlington Athletic Director Jon Fagg focused on a near singular topic each. As the interview reached the half way mark, the topics came closer in time and at a quicker pace. There has been a small delay in the release of part four as I originally envisioned part four being the last portion. However, the post itself started becoming too long. 

As we transition from the topic of football, we started discussing the sports we have on campus.

The Maverick Rambler: Well let's talk about pouring the efforts into, into men's basketball.

Jon Fagg: Yeah, sure.

Volleyball Preseason is Near the End

The Western Athletic Conference released the 2025 volleyball preseason poll and I have a suspicion that the UT Arlington Mavericks will feel a little disrespected. The defending champs were picked second by the conference's coaches.

The Utah Valley Wolverines were tagged as the preseason favorites, garnering five of the seven coaches first-place votes and a total of 34 points. UTA garnered one and the Utah Tech Trailblazers grabbed the final first-place vote. The Mavs edged the Blazers in total points, 29 to 25.

California Baptist was fourth (21), Abilene Christian (17), Tarleton State (12) and Southern Utah (9) round out the preseason poll.

Coaching Carousel

I had wondered what would happen in the offseason regarding the UT Arlington volleyball team in more than one regard. The loss of five graduate seniors, four of whom were regular starters, casts a lot of question marks coming into next season. Now another question is added.

Announced on Friday, J.T. Wenger, the head coach for the past eight years, will become the next head coach for the Gonzaga Bulldogs of the West Coast Conference. He leaves the Mavs after a career 140-92 record, good for a .603 winning percentage.

I wondered if he would catapult the 29-3 2024 season with the regular season and Western Athletic Conference tournament championship that resulted in an NCAA tournament appearance into a higher profile, higher resourced or more nationally-known job. I wasn't sure either way if he would for one main reason. 

What a Season

While I wanted this up sooner, this will likely be my last post about the 2024 UT Arlington volleyball team this year. The fact it comes in December is remarkable and a long time coming. A season to remember has finally ended in the 2024 NCAA volleyball tournament.

After completing an amazing run in the Western Athletic Conference tournament that culminated in an instant classic in the championship match between UTA and GCU, UTA took its WAC championship title to the NCAA Tournament Selection committee for an automatic berth.

Coming into Selection Sunday, UTA had a 29-2 record and a 43 RPI ranking. I have no memory of a higher ranking for either category. The Mavs won 26 in 2002 when I was a student broadcaster. There were 25 wins in 2006 and 2014. Ironically, both those teams lost in the tournament to the eventual champion, meaning a 26th win in either season would have been against the eventual winner. Also of note, both those years, the eventual tourney champ won a match in the NCAA tourney. Since the turn of the century, UTA's conference has won a match in the NCAA tourney three times. Two of those times were in 2006 and 2014. Undoubtedly, UTA played a role in getting those teams a favorable seed.

The Mavericks were sent down to Austin as the equivalent of the third seed like in what would occur in the baseball and softball tournaments. If it was similar to the basketball tournament, it would have been an 11 seed.

The UT Austin Longhorns were seeded third in their 16-team section of the bracket. There are four main sections in the bracket with 16 teams each. and only the top eight teams are seeded within the region. The University of Southern California was also sent to Austin as a six seed and that would be UTA's opponent.

Instant Classic

The UT Arlington Mavericks volleyball team is not only the Western Athletic Conference regular seasons champs, but the Tournament champs after Saturday's win against Grand Canyon University in the championship game.

It was a memorable weekend, one that would likely have an impact on the top ten moments entry, UTA competed in an instant classic in the championship match. It culminated three days of intense volleyball at College Park Center, and not just in matches involving UTA. 

The Mavericks opened the weekend against Abilene Christian in the one/eight seed match. Continuing the sweeps from the prior two matches of the year, UTA swept the Wildcats, winning 25-17, 25-18, 25-14. It was the exact dominant performance the average fan would expect from the first game or match of any sports tournament featuring the same seeds. It showed to me UTA was ready and came on a mission. 

However, after the first round was complete, I became very apprehensive.

Postseason Accolades

I mentioned in the comments of the last volleyball post that the UT Arlington Mavericks squad should be well represented. The awards and all-conference teams were announced by the Western Athletic Conference today and as a whole, it came to fruition.

I'll start with Player of the Year. While some teams had an impact player or two, it is hard to suppress what graduate student Brianna Ford did at her outside hitter position. She led the WAC in kills, kills per set, points and was fourth in hitting percentage, sixth in blocks, seventh in aces, ninth in blocks per set and tenth in digs. Were she playing on another team, some of those numbers would likely be higher as UTA spread the wealth around. UTA would have been good without her, but her presence on both the offensive and defensive side is what propelled the Mavs to their highest win total in three and a half decades.

Ford is the ninth Player of the Year in program history and the first since Olaya Pazo in 2002. 

Postseason Time

The regular season has concluded for all volleyball programs in the Western Athletic Conference. For the first time since a nine-match conference slate in the Southland Conference in 1992, UT Arlington has run the gamut undefeated.

Coming into the week, or rather, since my last blog post, UTA beat Tarleton for a 14-0 conference mark. With a Utah trip on the schedule, the Mavs were looking to make a mark in the history books.

Southern Utah has been on a slide of late and hosted on Thursday. The Thunderbirds took a set from UTA in Arlington and repeated that feat again, with UTA taking the other three sets. After a less-than-comfortable 25-21 set win, the Mavs and 'birds went toe-to-toe in set two, with neither team getting more than a three-point lead. At the end of the set, SUU staved off two set points for UTA and then claimed the set on their first try for a 26-24 win. They ended on a 4-0 run.

That appeared to upset UTA as the final two sets were won by 11 points each time and UTA moved one match away from perfection. 

Championship a Long Time Coming

 Coming into this academic year, there was a paradox on campus for the UT Arlington Mavericks. One team sport dominates all the others for conference championships and postseason wins. However, that same team sport had the longest drought between conference titles.

At 12, this program was second to all UTA sports in the conference title tally, with the men's tennis team taking the lead with 13 thanks to two WAC titles in a row. Men's indoor track was tied at 12 while the outdoor squad and women's tennis had 11.

Coming in, all those previous teams kept adding titles with the last decade or less. The program in question hadn't won a title in the previous 21 seasons. But no longer.

Running like a New Machine

The UT Arlington volleyball team flipped the schedule from Thursday/Saturday matches to Saturday/Monday matches this week, but the result stayed steady as the Mavericks grabbed two wins against California Baptist and Abilene Christian. 

CBU took the Mavs to five sets in Riverside, California earlier in the year. CBU is one of the few teams in the Western Athletic Conference UTA has not swept. Southern Utah and Utah Valley are the others, though UTA has only played once.

It looked like the Mavs would cruise early in the match as they took the first set 25-17. UTA looked in control and like they were operating smoothly. The passes were clean and the attacks were on target. But set two looked like CBU ironed out their offense as they had a hitting percentage near a third. UTA's defense looked a step behind and the score was flipped 18-25. Set three and four saw a return to the first set as the Mavs allowed 18 and 19 points en route to a 3-1 match win.

Speed Bump?

The skipping record of Western Conference volleyball action where the UT Arlington squad lands two wins in the week continued this past week. It wasn't the flawless victory seen in past weeks but in volleyball, sets matter, though matches matter the most. A sweep is the same mark in the win column as a five-set match. As UTA won the most in both scenarios making another post starts and ends with UTA atop the WAC standings.

It was road-trip week starting in Seattle on Thursday. Much like the 3-0 sweep a couple weeks ago in Arlington, the Redhawks were met the same fate but unlike the Arlington affair, SU was not an easy out in the first two sets. While UTA scored 25 in both, the Redhawks got the maximum points a set loser can have each time. In the third, UTA pushed aside two straight 25-23 wins and secured the match with a comfy 25-13 win, I'll save the individual accolades for later, but it was the same ladies who have been doing the same damage all year.

On Saturday, the Mavericks faced their first real stress in conference play as the Utah Valley Wolverines hosted UTA. After six straight sweeps prior to that affair, UTA lost the first two sets to UVU. You'd have to go back to the second conference match to get to a five-set contest involving UTA. That is what they would be shooting for to keep their perfect conference mark. 

Another Large Step

At some point, I'd expect the record to stop skipping, but another week is done in Western Athletic Conference volleyball action and another 2-0 week for UT Arlington. The opponents are likely the toughest the conference will have to offer and the Mavericks aced the test.

The Mavs are now in the driver's seat for their first conference regular season title in 22 years. Weird to say, but the team sport with the best history, most conference titles and NCAA tournament appearances and wins has had a drought so long that students on campus were not alive for the last titles. 

The conference season is half complete and UTA is up on second-place Grand Canyon by two matches, three games up on third-place Utah Valley and three-and-a-half up on fourth-place Utah Tech and Southern Utah. UTA in now 2-0 against Grand Canyon, while they are 1-0 versus UT and SUU.

They got to two of those three records this past week with two dominant performances, both sweeps. First up was the 'lopes in Arlington. After a 3-1 win in Phoenix, including a 25-8 shellacking in the first set. I firmly expected a tough, hard-fought match.

Big Showdown Looming

 Another Western Athletic Conference week is in the book for the UT Arlington volleyball squad and they repeated the same formula from the previous two conference weeks as they went undefeated, going 2-0.

It would have been easier to stumble in the third week of WAC play than in any other week due what's on tap this week. But as it is, other than some brief hiccups, the Mavericks did not drop a set in two sweeps. The wins moved their conference mark to 6-0 and 16-2 overall.

On Thursday, the Seattle Redhawks came to town and until SU went on a brief 4-0 run near the end of the third set, the Mavericks never took a timeout. That is pretty significant as coaches use timeouts to manage the runs by their opponents. Seattle made mild runs here and there and held brief, small leads. But the Mavs never looked stressed or out of control. By contrast, prior to the SU run / timeout in the third, UTA was leading 24-17 and Seattle looked demoralized. It has been a while since I have seen a Maverick opponent look like they were readily waving the white flag, but I did on Thursday.

Keep Rolling

 I'm going to shake up how I cover the UT Arlington volleyball squad this week. The last few weeks I have covered it set by set however, it feels long and congested to me. Proofreading it sometimes feels like a slog, so I'm not sure what it feels like to the average reader. I'll let you judge how it flows and tell me in the comments which you prefer, or if it matters.

This past week was like most of the rest of the 2024 season. There wasn't much that was left in doubt. So far, the Western Athletic Conference race isn't shaping up as predicted but that's a common occurrence.

Southern Utah, predicted eighth in the nine-team WAC, visited College Park Center for an early season test for number one. The Thunderbirds defeated Abilene Christian and Tarleton State in week one. ACU (6) and Tarleton (5) were predicted middle of the pack, so while they weren't world beating wins, SUU was hitting above their projections. 

Despite a third set hiccup, the Mavericks won handily in four, 25-13, 25-14, 19-25, 25-14. There was no real sweat in either set save the third. The Mavs took control early and kept it handily. In three set wins, if your opponent didn't surpass 14, that is a blowout.

Almost a Letdown

 There will not be as many matches to talk about for the UT Arlington volleyball team now that conference play has started. At most there will be two matches a week, and occasionally, thanks to the odd number of Western Athletic Conference teams, one match to talk about.

But what a week it was. Conference play started with the conference preseason one and two going at it. The experienced Mavs, forecasted second to Grand Canyon's preseason prognostication of first, were playing their supposed betters. On top of that, UTA was on the road at their place. And, after winning the first two matches of the series, UTA had lost three straight entering Thursday.

There clearly was a chip on the Mavericks shoulder. It had to be some combo of underdog, away team and losing streak. The first set deceptively started as a slugfest the match was thought to be, as UTA led 1-0, tied 1-1, then another Mav lead at 3-1. 3-2. then 5-3. While still close at 8-5, the Mavs used runs of 5-0. 3-0. and 7-0, the latter ended the set, for an unpredicted 25-8 win. Graduate Student Brianna Ford scored two aces in that clinching run to go with three kills in the set, below her kill per set average. With such a dominating performance, and only three from the offensive engine, speaks to the depth this offense possesses.

Small Speed Bump

The UT Arlington volleyball team finished the fourth weekend of the current season and there's nothing I saw that changed the outlook for the season. UTA finished the previous three weekends of three-game tournaments with wins in all matches. That didn't happen this time around and no one but the most homer of homer fans would have expected something similar.

This week's tournament took place in Fort Worth for the Horned Frog Invitational. In a change of pace, the first match was Tuesday. I was surprised to see there were no midweek matches this year. No Tuesday affair against North Texas, Stephen F. Austin, Texas State or other geographically close University. While technically not a true mid-week match, it did have that feel

For the first time I can remember, TCU was ranked in the top 25 at the start of the match. In a testament to how well volleyball is doing in Dallas/Fort Worth, SMU, who does not appear on the schedule, is also ranked. At this point in time, all three schools are a combined 25-7. North Texas has played a tough schedule en route to 3-8 record, but 0-5 versus Power 5 teams. 

Streak Unbroken

The UT Arlington volleyball squad completed the Dr. Mary Jo Wynn Invitational in Springfield, Missouri yesterday and like the previous two tournaments, they took the tourney title, winning all three matches. Like the previous tournament in Arlington, UTA won two by sweeps and a thrilling third match in five sets.

The weekend tournament started on Thursday with the host in Missouri State. In the three-game sweep, the Mavericks won the first two sets by identical 25-19 scores. The third set was tighter and tested UTA, but again, the Mavs came out on top 25-23. 

Brianna Ford, the Graduate Senior Outside Hitter led the Mavericks in kills with 13, digs with 16, Graduate Student Setter Mollie Blank had an efficient 38 assists and Paige Reagor, another Graduate Student at Middle Blocker had three blocks. Impressively to me, the team had a 40.6 hitting percentage in the first set. It fell to a more median .279 for the match, but that was a great way to start the weekend.

On Friday, Saint Louis was on tap for the middle match. At 3-3 entering the day, SLU was kind of an unknown. UTA still handled business in the sweep, the seventh of the year. The match certainly was competitive to start. After UTA built a 17-13 lead, Saint Louis went on a 6-2 and an 8-3 run to take a one-point lead. The Billikens had set point at 24-23, but the Mavs reeled off three straight points for a 26-24 win. After that, UTA left no doubt winning the last two sets by identical 25-12 scores. 

Winning Streak Continues

 After a great start to season Lafayette, Louisiana, the UT Arlington Volleyball squad hosted its own tournament this past weekend. The streak of sweeps ended in the first match, but the winning streak is still going strong after a good showing. Like last week, the opponents may not have been at the top of the NCAA, but again, UTA took care of its business in a convincing manner.

That first match was a 3-2 win against Santa Clara. The first set was super tight early until UTA built a 16-11 lead. The Broncos chipped away, though the Mavs still led 22-19. SC scored the last three points though for the 26-24 win. In the second set, UTA cruised 25-15, before losing by a similar score in the third. A comfy 25-19 fourth set win forced a deciding fifth.

The Mavs jumped to an early 4-0 lead. After a timeout, Santa Clara claimed momentum, climbing to an 11-10 lead. Kudos to this experienced bunch of Mavs, they completed a 5-2 run to close out the match and move to 4-0. 

Fantastic Start

 The UT Arlington volleyball team opened it's season this past weekend and while the teams were not the upper echelon of the NCAA, Maverick fans could not have asked for a better result.

The Mavs traveled to Lafayette, Louisiana as a participant in the Sawyer Camillo Memorial Classic. The Mavs opened the four-team round-robin tournament against the Missouri Valley Conference's Murray State. In a theme for the weekend, the Mavs swept the Racers 3-0. The first set was tight, as UTA came out on top 26-24. The second set was also tight, 25-22 while the third was a more comfortable 25-19.

Graduate Senior Outside Hitter Brianna Ford did Brianna Ford things to get 18 kills in the three-set win. Sophomore Outsider Hitter Samantha Glenn led the team with 10 digs. Mollie Blank, the preseason Setter of the Year as a Graduate Senior, logged 34 assists. Impressively, Sophomore Outside Hitter Evyn Snook notched four aces.

The following day, the Southwestern Athletic Conference's Jackson State sat opposite the net. The end result was the same, a 3-0 Maverick win. UTA dominated the first and third sets, 25-14 and 25-18 respectively. The second set was a little closer than it maybe should have at 25-22, but the Mavs still came out on top. 

2024 Volleyball Season is Nigh

 The UT Arlington Athletic Department kicks off the 2024/25 athletic season later this week as the Volleyball team travels to their first match of the season. As is customary, the Western Athletic Conference released its preseason poll and as I alluded to a couple of blog entries ago, the Mavs have garnered respect in the conference.

To refresh, in the UTA hosting championship post, I mentioned the volleyball team is returning a lot of talent. In conjunction, the WAC lost two of its top four programs in Stephen F. Austin and UT Rio Grande Valley. Looking at who is returning, last year's results and recent historical performance, this year's preseason volleyball poll was about as easy as it gets, even in the transfer portal era. 

As we head into the season, here's what the prognosticator's think the final standings will look like, with first place votes in parenthesis: