The University of Texas at Austin Athletics
University of Texas
Kansas State
No. 2 Volleyball preview: Kansas State
11.17.2021 | Volleyball
The Longhorns will host Kansas State for the final regular season home matches at Gregory Gym.
No. 2 Texas Volleyball vs. Kansas State
Texas: 20-1 (11-1) | Kansas State: 15-8 (6-6)
Thursday, Nov. 18 – 7 p.m. CT | Friday, Nov. 19 – 7 p.m. CT
Gregory Gymnasium | Austin, Texas
THE MATCHUP
Texas leads the all-time series with Kansas State, 46-8, and holds a 25-3 advantage all-time in Austin. Last season, the Longhorns won a pair of matches over the Wildcats in Manhattan. The first match was a five-set thriller as Texas had to rally from down 2-1. Logan Eggleston led the way with 37 total kills (4.6 per set), while Asjia O'Neal had 21 kills and 12 total blocks over the two matches.
HOME COURT ADVANTAGE
A large part of the Longhorns winning nine of the last 10 Big 12 Championships has come down to winning at home. Texas has won 57-straight home matches in Big 12 play, dating back to the 2014 season. During that streak, the Longhorns have had 44 sweeps and only dropped a total of 16 sets. Over the last 11 seasons, the Longhorns have gone 93-1 in home league matches. The Longhorns' only home Big 12 loss since 2010 came against Oklahoma on Oct. 25, 2014.
SENIOR NIGHT
Texas will recognize its two seniors, Brionne Butler and Sydney Petersen in their final regular season home matches this weekend. Butler is a three-time All-American who ranks in the top-10 in program history with 454 career blocks. Petersen has played in 105 career matches and record 987 career digs.
ACE IN THE HOLE
The Longhorn service game has been lethal early this season, currently ranking second in the nation with 2.23 aces per set (158 aces in 71 sets). Melanie Parra leads the Big 12 and ranks fifth nationally with 43 aces and Logan Eggleston has 36. Asjia O'Neal has 26 aces and Nalani Iosia is fourth on the team with 21. In all, Texas has six players with 10 or more aces so far this season.
BLOCK PARTY
Over the last eight matches, the Longhorns are averaging 10.5 blocks per match and opponents are averaging just under four. With this recent block surge, Texas leads the Big 12 and ranks No. 12 nationally with 2.67 blocks per set. The Longhorns are also holding opponents to a .156 hitting percentage, which leads the Big 12 and ranks fourth among Power 5 teams.
EFFICIENCY
Texas ranks third nationally with a .334 hitting percentage this season. Brionne Butler leads the Big 12 and ranks fourth nationally, hitting .447, while Molly Phillips is hitting .380, Asjia O'Neal is at .364 and Skylar Fields is hitting .336. All four players rank in the top-10 in the Big 12. Last season, Texas hit .334 on the season to finish third in the nation. That mark was also the fourth-best in Longhorn history. The 2019 team led the nation with a .325 hitting percentage, which is the fifth-best in Texas history. The Longhorns hit over a .300 clip in each of the last six seasons from 2015-20, all ranking in the top-10 single season marks in program history.
RANKINGS
Texas sits in the No. 2 spot in the AVCA Coaches' Poll for the second consecutive week. Returning nearly the entire roster from the team that finished as the NCAA runner-up last season, Texas was picked first in the Preseason AVCA Poll and remained in the top spot for 10-consecutive weeks. The Longhorns are one of two Big 12 teams in the top-25 as Baylor sits at No. 7.
RANK AND FILE
UT owns a 128-56 (.696) record against ranked opponents over the last 18 seasons (2004-21) and boasts a 59-12 (.829) home mark against ranked opponents at Gregory Gymnasium (56-12) and the Frank Erwin Center (3-0) during that span. So far this season, Texas is 4-1 against ranked opponents with wins over San Diego, Minnesota, Stanford and Baylor. The Longhorns have gone 14-1 against RPI Top-50 teams with a pair of Top-50 opponents still on the schedule, in Kansas State and Texas Tech.
ELLIOTT MAKES TEXAS HISTORY
On Oct. 22 at Iowa State, Texas head coach Jerritt Elliott won his 523rd match at Texas, making him the winningest coach in Texas Longhorns Volleyball history. He surpassed Mick Haley, who won 522 matches at Texas from 1980-96. Elliott's career .829 winning percentage is the best in program history.
WEEKLY AWARDS
• Texas has claimed five Big 12 Offensive Player of the Week awards this season, the most by any school in the league. Logan Eggleston has received the award three times, while Skylar Fields has won it twice. Asjia O'Neal has also won the Defensive Player of the Week award once.
• Logan Eggleston received back-to-back Big 12 Offensive Player of the Week awards after big weeks against Baylor and Oklahoma. Against Oklahoma, she totaled 27 kills (4.50 per set) and her hitting percentage of .455 led all Big 12 hitters with at least 40 total attempts during the week. Against Baylor, Eggleston led the league with 5.14 kills per set during the week, finishing with 36 kills in the two matches.
• Asjia O'Neal was named Big 12 Defensive Player of the Week on Oct. 26. O'Neal had a tremendous blocking performance in a pair of road wins over Iowa State. She had back-to-back nine block efforts to tally 18 total blocks on the weekend. O'Neal also added 10 kills, three aces and three digs over the two matches.
• Skylar Fields was named the AVCA National Player of the Week and the Big 12 Offensive Player of the Week on Oct. 5 following the back-to-back sweeps of West Virginia. Fields finished with 31 kills and hit .537 over the two matches.
• Logan Eggleston and Skylar Fields were the back-to-back recipients of the Big 12 Conference Offensive Player of the Week award, Sept 7 and Sept. 14. Eggleston was awarded on Sept. 7 following wins over No. 10 Minnesota and No. 20 Stanford. She had 30 total kills (4.29 kills per set) and finished with 17 digs, six blocks and one service ace. Fields won the award after wins over Texas State, Arizona and Notre Dame in which she totaled 43 kills and a .380 hitting percentage.
ROAD WARRIORS
The Longhorns have won 19 of their last 20 road matches dating back to the 2019 season. Since the 2011 season Texas has produced a 100-19 (.840) record in true road matches, with only four of those losses coming to unranked teams. The Longhorns' last two road losses have been against top-10 ranked Baylor.
CHAMPIONSHIP PEDIGREE
After clinching last season's Big 12 title, the Longhorns have won 26 conference championships, including 13 Big 12 titles and 13 Southwest Conference Championships. The 2020 title was the fourth-straight Big 12 Championship for the Longhorns, who have won or shared nine of the last 10 league championships and 12 of the previous 14.
FIVE ALL-AMERICANS
Texas returns five players who landed on the AVCA All-American teams in 2020, led by first teamers Logan Eggleston and Brionne Butler. Additionally, Jhenna Gabriel was named to the third team and Skylar Fields and Asjia O'Neal received Honorable Mention All-America accolades. Eggleston and Butler received their third All-American recognition, after being named second team All-Americans in 2019 and receiving honorable mention as freshmen in 2018.
Honda Inspiration Award winner
Asjia O'Neal was named the winner of the 2021 Honda Inspiration Award, presented annually by the Collegiate Women Sports Awards (CWSA). O'Neal recovered from open heart surgery in 2020 to help lead Texas to the runner-up finish at the NCAA Tournament. The heart surgery took place in January 2020 and was her second to repair a leak in her mitral valve, a condition she was born with. The surgery, which lasted more than eight hours, was extremely successful and there was no more leakage. O'Neal worked back to full strength and finished second in the Big 12 Conference with a .411 hitting percentage to go with 222 kills. She was named first team All-Big 12 and first team AVCA All-Region, as well as an Honorable Mention All-American. She also excelled in the classroom, being named to the Academic All-Big 12 First Team as a Corporate Communication major.
