or anyone else who has a considerable amount of Aggie Volleyball knowledge...

any insight on the squad this year as they head into the SEC, particularly on the freshmen? The coaches' pick for us to finish 2nd in the West is pretty awesome, considering we're new to the league.

We should have a great season with what we have returning. Miller and Kastmo provides height up from and much needed leadership after Black graduated. Mellinger last year was a surprise at OH but other than her, I'm not really sure who else will pack the punch that we lost with Black. Still not sold on Penderghast at libero though...

Any input would be nice. Season starts in 2 weeks, so let's get some discussion going!

Honestly I haven't been following the team as closely the last year or so. Its getting increasingly more difficult for me to watch us flounder around every year but then not do anything about it.

We have a really good crop of incoming freshman. If I had my way, most of them would be starting from day one, not necessarily because they are better than the current players, but because they have a much higher ceiling and chance to do something in their junior and senior years if they get experience now, similar to the development curve of the class that had Banse, Batis, and Ammerman.

Katsmo, Miller, and Sawatsky are all good players. Mellinger and Pendergast are both great Libero candidates in my opinion, but neither one should see time in the front row. I've heard great things about Sierra Patrick and I'm excited to see how college-ready she is. Other than that I don't really know too much, and I don't really expect us to make any noise at the NCAA level this year. The SEC is a huge drop off in volleyball compared to the Big-12, so being picked second by the coaches in the SEC west isn't much of a surprise. We should be competing with LSU every year to be at the top of the West even in the current state of our program. Tennessee, Kentucky, and Florida are all probably a notch above us at this point.