Pitt Wins a Tougher-Than-Ever ACC

Pitt lost its first set in the month of November. Dan Fisher didn’t have answers — at least for the ACCN announcers who asked: What happened to his team’s focus when they followed a first-set win over the Louisville Cardinals with a second-set dud?

"You tell me,” Fisher said with a chuckle. “If I knew, I would've switched it."

Pitt had played its worst set since, oh, I guess when they dropped one 25-22 to a Notre Dame team that’s now 5-14 in conference play. Louisville looked much sharper than the #1 team in the country “on both sides” in Set 2, according to Fisher.

“I think they hit .500,” Fisher said. (It was .481 — close enough.) “We weren't good enough defensively or offensively.”

As you can tell from the headline, Pitt turned it around in Sets 3 and 4 — hitting above .400 in both — to win their first match in Louisville since October 2019.

“We just talked about focusing on the little things,” Babcock said about the discussion at intermission. “I feel like in the second set we struggled with letting tips drop. We weren’t making aggressive errors, we were just making silly errors. So we just told ourselves if we’re going to make a mistake, it’s because we’re going all for it.”

They certainly went for it in the later sets, and setter Rachel Fairbanks directed traffic to her weapons splendidly, getting Olivia Babcock 23 kills on .311 hitting, Torrey Stafford 17 kills on .405 hitting, and Bre Kelley 8 kills on .467 hitting. Fairbanks was unafraid to set Babcock and Stafford in the back row and let them find the angles around Louisville’s block.

The Panthers hope to return to the Derby City in three weeks for volleyball’s Final Four, but they’ve already proven they can win in a Sea of Red lower bowl. The atmosphere inside the KFC Yum! Center will likely be less intimidating when the Louisville fans are spread out and other seats are filled with non-Cardinals fans for the championships.

But that’s the future. Right now, Pitt can celebrate a 3rd straight season with at least a share of the ACC title. And you can get the t-shirt!

This was the toughest the ACC has ever been, after the addition of NCAA-record-nine-time National Champions Stanford (Pitt swept them at home), faded former power Cal (Pitt swept them at home) and upstart SMU (Pitt swept them at home… then took their only loss of the season in Dallas).

The Panthers can take the outright ACC title with a home win over Georgia Tech on Saturday (another team they swept earlier this season), but for all intents Pitt could celebrate a conference championship with a win over the arch-rival Cardinals — as clear an ACC Title Game as you can get.

"It's just a bunch of people who want it, obviously the attitude plays a factor,” Babcock said. “I just feel like we bring out such a force in each other. I think just knowing that the ACC is such a competitive conference and knowing that we’re some of the best in the nation. We really just want to prove who deserves what.”

Olivia Babcock’s Night

It may have been too early for a Thanksgiving feast, but Fairbanks fed Babcock early and often on Wednesday night.

Babcock opened the match with seven kills in a 25-23 first-set victory on her way to tying a career high of 23 kills on .311 hitting.

“I think we learned how much confidence we have in each other, how much grit we have as a whole team,” Babcock told the announcers after the rivalry victory. “I feel like it just brings out the best in us.”

Louisville brings out the best in Babcock, who picked up 22 kills against the Cardinals back in October and 23 kills in last year's five-set win at the Pete. She will carry the weight of the offense and will apparently cook you up as part of a delicious turkey dinner.

Olivia Babcock remains the favorite for National Player of the Year, but her teammate on the opposite pin is also making noise.

Is Stafford the Nation’s Best Outside Hitter?

The metrics from volleyball analyst Chad Gordon certainly say Stafford is better than any other left-pin hitter, with a fresh batch of numbers just released.

Stafford has been a stellar all-around player in 2024, improving on the service line and in serve-receive, contributing well on the block, but most importantly terminating points on the left pin and in the back row.

Gordon’s stats on Stafford, prior to her double-double in the Louisville match, showed she has been far and away the best in-system outside hitter in the nation, scoring with .463 efficiency when her setter has all options available. Stafford’s strength showed again on Wednesday night with 17 kills and only 2 errors — fantastic work against one of the nation’s best defenses.

What’s more impressive is Stafford's .295 hitting when Pitt is out of system, demonstrating her ability to end a rally even on plays when the Panthers aren’t passing perfectly. That skill will become crucial in the tournament when Pitt faces strong serves and swings in the later rounds.

Additional note: Anna DeBeer, ranked 8th in the nation by Gordon’s metrics, led the Cards with 14 kills — which is still lower than her kill count as heiress to the DeBeers blood diamond fortune.1

Ready for December

We’ll preview the NCAA Tournament once Selection Sunday gives Pitt its path to the title, but we can already see that the Panthers will be confident they can beat any team they face.

Pitt has beaten #3 Louisville twice (113-103 on points at home, 93-84 at Louisville), swept #4 Penn State (75-52) and swept #7 Stanford (75-53). In all cases, Pitt has been able to put pressure on strong opponents with an even stronger serve.

I’ve enjoyed using Evollve’s ratings this season, and the Evollve Rating has Pitt firmly #1 above Nebraska, Creighton and Louisville. Winning 60% of your points against the toughest schedule you've ever faced is incredibly impressive. So pulling off sweeps in more than 82% of your matches.2

There are teams I would rather see Pitt face than others, but ultimately Pitt would be favored throughout the NCAA Tournament until a potential power vs. power matchup against Nebraska in the National Championship. I don’t like to make predictions here, but the volleyball experts have seen the Panthers and the Cornhuskers as the top two teams by far, on a collision course for the National Title. Pitt’s decisive win over Louisville only served to cement that top-two status.