LOVB Triangles 25 Part 2
First Ball
This week I’m sharing Triangle analysis for the 2025 LOVB Pro Women’s season. I have to squeeze this in quick, because there’s only a few days in between the end of the regular season and the beginning of the playoffs.
First Ball
Differential
52% - Atlanta (+52)
50% - Austin (+7)
50% - Houston (+5)
50% - Salt Lake (-1)
49% - Madison (-20)
49% - Omaha (-43)
Not a big disparity between teams, although you might notice that the magnitudes in First Ball (per % of differential) are greater than Terminal Serving. LOVB played about 45% of the game in First Ball, so a small edge here provides a big advantage. Atlanta was about 3 points per match better than the median and Omaha was about 3 points per match worse. But also, it’s only 3 points in either direction between 1st and last! The small margins of volleyball never cease to amaze me.
Let’s look at some of the factors within the First Ball battle.
FB Efficiency
0.290 - Atlanta
0.259 - Madison
0.254 - Salt Lake
0.252 - Omaha
0.249 - Austin
0.240 - Houston
Opponent FB Efficiency
0.234 - Austin
0.237 - Atlanta
0.239 - Houston
0.270 - Salt Lake
0.275 - Madison
0.293 - Omaha
0.258 was the average First Ball Efficiency, so you see here some teams that have more of an offensive strength and others that have more of a defensive strength. For example, The Houston offense was last in the league, well below-average. But their defense was well above-average, giving them about a neutral differential in First Ball.
On the other hand, you have Madison and Omaha, with pretty solid offenses but who struggled to stop their opponents in First Ball.
Do we see any trends when it comes to individual players? Well we see Atlanta at the top of the First Ball Efficiency chart. We saw in Part 1 that they have the libero (Piyanut) who takes the largest share of receptions of any libero in the league and allows the fewest aces. While her Good Pass % was not the best in the league, she’s in the ballpark. In fact, when you look at all 3 of their primary passers, you can guess how Atlanta is at the top of that category:
3 of the top 6 passers in the league. Although it should be noted that the difference between 4th and 10th is essentially negligible. There’s no real impact on winning between a 51.5% Good Pass and 50.0. But, as a team, Atlanta is ahead by a mile in reception quality, so it’s no surprise they are at the top of First Ball Efficiency:
If teams can’t serve Atlanta into trouble, I think the odds of them losing are low. But what’s interesting is, when you divide offense by pass quality, they don’t necessarily stand out:
Their offense is certainly solid, but compare them to Austin’s, for example. Atlanta is siding out 4% better despite having essentially the same offense by pass quality. That’s the power of serve receive right there!
Now let’s flip over to the defensive side of the First Ball Equation, where Austin was the toughest to score against. From an individual standpoint, they lead the league in blocks per set:
(Also worth noting that, while Atlanta was blocked the least, 2nd-place Houston was blocked the most of any team in the league. There’s not a strong correlation between getting blocked and winning.)
And had the top individual blocker in Chiaka Ogbogu along with Molly McCage in 4th.
What does that mean for the upcoming playoffs?
It means that, if Austin is going to pull off an upset and advance, it’s going to be on the strength of their defense- particularly their blocking.
But as we saw in Part 1, if you’re predicting the championship, it’s going to be tough to bet against Atlanta and their combination of Serve/Pass and First Ball Efficiency.
I’ll round out the final part of my preview tomorrow when we look at Transition.