3 Reacting to USA vs. Japan Volleyball 2022 FIVB VNL

What's up everyone? Welcome back. And if you are new here, welcome to my channel where we talk about all things volleyball. Okay guys, quick update from here in Poland. Our season has started. I am here in Poland for my second season with Zaksa Kajec and Kozle. Be sure to follow them on their social below right here. We had our first game on the road yesterday in Olsztyn and we were able to win 3-2-1. It was such an awesome way to open the season and we weren't exactly 100% but we came together as a team, we fought so hard and we're able to come away with the win. So we are currently 1-0. Alright guys, so for today's video we're going to be watching a match from the first round of the 2022 FIVB Volleyball Nations League. Now if you guys don't know, the Volleyball Nations League or the VNL is a 6 or 7 week long tournament composed of 16 teams, 3 rounds and then a final round consisting of 8 teams. The quarterfinals, semifinals and finals. Now this match, USA against Japan was in the first week of the VNL held in Brazil. So we're going to take a look. This was a 5 set match. We're going to be watching the 5th set. Let's get into it. So before we get into today's video, I just want to talk about why I wasn't here in this leg of the VNL. So last season, our Champions League final match was on May 22nd. And the team left for Brazil, the VNL, I believe on May 27th or May 28th. So personally, I felt like I wanted a break, I needed a break, so I talked to my coaches. I said, can I have this leg of the VNL off? And luckily they were very gracious and said, okay Eric, take this break, take some time to be home with family and friends, recover physically, mentally, everything and be ready for the next portion of the VNL. So I wasn't here with my team, unfortunately. I hated watching it actually without me there, but fortunately they did a great job and we'll see in this match. All right, let's go. Okay, 5th set starting. This quality is really weird of this video. Thomas serving, goes with the flow, and he started with a miss. Sorry Thomas. All right, Takahashi here, Japan superstar, great pass Thomas, and Jeff with the kill. Let's watch this pass again. So what you love to see out of Thomas here is that he just made this service error, right? He let that ball go out, he served it out, what am I trying to say? But then he comes back with this beautiful pass. You can see his arms are already out there and the ball is maybe a good meter, meter and a half away from him, which you love to see. Perfect angle, takes that seam ball, Josh delivers to Jeff for the point. Beautiful point. Okay, Jeff serving. I'm actually going to play against Jeff on Tuesday, which is maybe when this video is going to be out, but I got to be ready for this float serve. Puts it on the line, Takahashi, and then Yuki Ishikawa with the perfect tip. He's so good at these. You can see, he sees that little hole in the block right there, puts his arm up, and even if you see this as a defender, it's pretty hard to read because he just tips it right into the block, super quick, tough to stop. Number two serving, Onodera, 2-1 Japan, goes with the float, he can go with both. Okay, Aaron, nice defense, go touch it, and Ishikawa using the block. So this is the challenging part about playing Japan. One, they serve really well. You can see that float was driven super low to the net, dropped on Aaron even though he made a great pass, and then they also play great defensive transition volleyball. They play great defense, and then they transition out of it and get kills like that. So that's why they're really good. One of the reasons why they're really good. Onodera serving again, three serving one, going at Aaron again, nice pass, drop that right shoulder, and end sink. So if we can get that pass, we can also run a quick offense, and you can see here, Aaron gets a great pass here, pause, drop, see his right shoulder drop? When you're in position five, that's kind of what you have to do to get the ball to your right. Drop that right shoulder, arms are out, create that angle, and then Josh, who I played yesterday in Olshton, delivers this quick ball to Kyle. They got that Long Beach connection. He puts it away. All right, Kyle Ensing serving. He was an opposite throughout the BNL and also at the World Championships. He's playing in France currently. Just perfect pass, perfect play by Japan. I have no words. Great pass here, runs the bick to Takahashi, puts it away. So I got a question online recently, and I want to start doing this more. It's from Guillermo C. saying, Hey, Eric, can you do a video on how to communicate with your teammates, when to communicate, keywords, et cetera, as a libero? It's something I want to improve on going into 2023. Thanks. So yes, we'll talk about this right now. You can see our guys, hopefully here, maybe before they did this, starting to communicate about the play already. Who's going to take what ball, where the server likes to serve, who has which seams. All this communication is going to happen midpoint. You can see D'Agostino going right now, talking about that middle. So you want to talk about the server, where they like to serve, who has which portion of the court, which person is going to take the ball, is the middle going to take the short? All these things are going to help you become a more effective communicator. Aaron high hands, transition, nice up, Kyle. And we put it away. What? I got to watch that play again. How did we put this away? So I love this dig by Kyle. He gets right in that seam. You can see he makes that great move to his right, gets a high ball. I know Thomas wants this ball a little bit tighter because that's what we practice, but Aaron finds this seam and puts the ball away. You can see Japan kind of half blocked there. I think if they were to go back, maybe they would want to not block or put up more of a solid block. So now we're in between plays. Let's see how Japan communicates here. You can see they're high fiving. They're already talking about the side out, probably talking about who's serving. You can see Takahashi talking. What's challenging is that in the fifth set, you kind of already know what you want to do, but you want to keep up that communication throughout the match. In the fifth set, it's really important because it's a race to 15. So Aaron's serving. Is it over? Nope. How did he save that? Nice transition by us. So Sakita, he's not the tallest setter out there, but he can make plays like this. Look at that. Ball might be going over the net and he saves it. Aaron great up. David, David, David. Beautiful back set for a middle blocker, just for anyone, honestly, and then Kyle puts it away. So that play was made by great defense, beautiful transition setting by David, and then Kyle just doing what he does best. Aaron serving, four to four. It's okay. Got to be aggressive against Japan. Yuki serving, five serving, four, Japan up into the net. We'll take it. All right. Cody Kesselman serving, serving sub. He has a good float down the line. Beautiful pass. Nice touch. Josh, transition. Yes. Let's see this block because this is the block that made it. Beautiful left hand. You can see Josh just gets over. He's not the biggest blocker, but he gets that left hand over the net, gets a great touch. Transition. Thomas. Perfect. Quick ball outside and puts it away. Love that. I think one thing that young players need to understand is that you don't have to be the biggest blocker out there. You don't need to be 6'10 and getting your chest over the net. Does it help? Probably. But Josh there, he's 6'3. He's not the biggest jumper, he'll say that, but what he does is he gets his arms over the net. He penetrates over and that's what takes up space. It's not always about getting the monster blocks. Yes. We love those, but if you can get great touches and transitions like that, it's just as good as the stuff. Okay. 6'5. Cody serving again. Float. Ooh, that dropped. Nice pass by Yamamoto. We opened up that seam. So you can see here. Let's watch. Josh gets there on this block. His hand is over, but then he reaches out to his right just a little bit. And that's because Takahashi's body turned. But what Takahashi's so good at is that he turns his body, but then still goes away from his shoulder. So you can see Josh just opens up that seam a little bit, and then there's just too much power. So yeah. And you can see here, he says, my bad, because he knew he reached out. The previous one, he got that left hand over really good and touched the ball. Tough to see in real time. I mean, these are world-class hitters, but I think we definitely want that one back. I'm pretty sure we watched that one in video. I know these guys did. 6'0. Yamauchi serving. Float. He doesn't miss very often. Josh serving. 7'6. Lefty serve. Let's see the spin. Yep. Got some good tail on it. Gosh. Japan is passing. Monster block by Jeff. All right. I got to watch that one for Tuesday. So Josh, it's a good serve in here. We probably called a commit. I can't really tell. But what Jeff does so well in this play is that he dives to his left. You can see right here. He doesn't go straight over. He goes to the left a little bit, gets those hands over, and gets the stuff. When you're one-on-one with a middle, you're probably going to have to make a move one way or the other, because if they can carve up the angle, it's probably going to be a point. So what Jeff does there is that he takes the wrist away, the shot to area five, Onodera's strength, one of his strengths, and gets the block. All right. Josh serving again. 8-6. Notice we don't switch sides, because in the VNL, we didn't switch sides in the fifth set. Go short. Look at Yamamoto there. Just so solid. He sees this short serve coming, takes a little step, pushes off his left foot, and gets the ball perfect. And then the lefty. It's not Nishida. I can't remember his name. I'm so sorry. But he is pretty freaking good, too. But fortunately for us, he just took off a little bit too much on that line and missed Thomas' arm. All right. Out of the timeout. Nine serving six. Josh. Woo. That's not what he wanted to do. You can see he's a little pissed at himself. But again, against Japan, it's tough. It's a tough balance. You want to be aggressive, but then you also, when you're up 9-6, maybe you want to keep that in. I don't serve. I don't know. Lefty. Took something off of it. See? Kept that one in. What a play. So what I love about this is that it's against the flow. You can see Josh running to our left. But then what he does so well is that he throws off the blockers by going behind him. Boom. No block up. With Aaron getting a pipe like that with no block, it's pretty hard to dig. Beautiful play. All right. Thomas. Ten serving seven. Remember he missed that first serve. Let's see what he does. He went with the float. Japan. This lefty is really good. So they get a great pass out of this. Let's see this block. Just right in the seam. I think Thomas is in a really good defensive spot. He's filling that seam where the blockers aren't, which you never really want to be standing behind a block unless it's a scattering report. But in this case, he steps up right in that seam, but just too much power. And that happens. It's volleyball. People spike really hard. Takahashi serving. Eight serving ten. Wind up. Nice fight, Thomas. Great recycle. What? This is getting crazy. Oh. What happened? I don't like to watch these things. But I got to watch this recycle by Aaron. So tight set. Aaron doesn't really have a chance to spike just because of the play that happened. But you can see here, he sets the ball right into the block. He sees that block. He sets it into it and recycles. That's what we call a recycle. He covers himself to give us another chance to play transition volleyball. Such a smart play. We get a chance to block, and then there's just off timing by Japan, which you don't see very often. But what made that play was that recycle by Aaron. Nice job. All right. Jeff serving. 11-8. He switched sides. He likes to serve from one to one. Got to remember that. Great pass. Oh. Free ball. Come on. Oh my gosh. Out. Oh. What just happened? So first of all, this pass is just beautiful. Pause. Slo-mo. Take notes over here. Look at that angle. Angles. That's what we talk about. Just right shoulder drop. Arms are out. Shoulders are forward. Feet are strong. Core is strong. And then this block by Kyle. See how he didn't reach out here because the last time we did that, we opened up the seam. Yeah. That's a really nice move there. And then Ishikawa goes for the deep free ball, which honestly would have worked, but it just went by this much out. I remember watching that one live like, holy crap. We just got so lucky. Okay. Jeff serving again. 12-8. Flow. Whoa. What? Beautiful. The stuff block. Okay. That pass just flawless. Great angle. Great fight. And then Kyle. See, that one he kind of did reach out, so I don't know. Honestly, I wasn't there. I don't know our scattering report. Maybe it got a little bit tight, so he wanted to reach out to the line. Just stuffs it. Kyle is a really good blocker, and you can see why right there. Okay. 13-8. Jeff serving again. He's going to go to area one, and Takashi's passing perfectly. Nice move by Kyle. Yuki just gets the tip out. What I love about this play is that you can see Kyle, once he sees that the set isn't going to his zone, he peels off on defense. Number five, he goes to the right, but then he sees it going to the middle, and he peels off. You can see his left shoulder coming off the net. He gets that dig. That is called off-blocker defense, and it saves points. It saves matches. It's awesome. Nice play. Unfortunately, it goes over. Ishikawa tips off the block. How many times can you do that? Okay. Onodera serving. 9-13. Caught Aaron a little bit high. It's okay. High ball. Nice defense. Free ball. Nice, Kyle. How does Japan get these balls up sometimes? Nice free ball by David. Kyle again. Nice. So, I really like one thing that Kyle D'Agostino did, the libero. So, this high ball set, for our USA system, we don't like to set the ball this wide for high balls. In general, we want to go two, three feet inside the antenna. So, Kyle knows that he didn't make the best set here, but what is great is that right here, he gets the perfect touch. So, the set might not have been perfect, but that free ball was, and he came back after, I can't even call it a mistake, just a minor, you know, just a little bit of a wide set. And then we get two free balls. Dave, again, with the perfect pass. And we get the ball. We get the point. 14-9 now. Match point number one against Japan. Fifth set. Kyle took something off of it. A little bit off the net, but pretty much perfect pass. How did we dig that? Aaron. Oh! That is such an epic way to win the fifth set. So, this is also off-blocker defense. Aaron, he makes that move, pushes off his left foot to get off the net. And we know that Ishikawa likes the sharp balls. He gets in front of it, digs that ball. See where that set is? This set right here. Two, three feet inside. Such a great set by Kyle D'Agostino. Aaron rips it high hand. Almost kills Takahashi in that corner. And we take the match. 15-9 in the fifth set. Nice job, boys. All right, guys. Great match. Great match to watch again. So much you can learn from. I think the biggest difference in that set was just USA's ability to block and transition and play defense. You could see that Japan was passing really well. But we were able to get some blocks, some touches, and transition out of that. So, great job by our team. In that first week of BNL, we went 4-0, which was so great. So, nice job, boys. But anyway, guys. I hope you enjoyed that video. I hope you learned a little bit. I know that I did. Match here in Poland on Tuesday and Saturday. So, be sure to follow along on social media. I hope you have a great day. Get out. Play some volleyball. Have some fun. And I'll see you all soon. Peace.