Utah @ #8 Arizona State 10-4-2025 WVB

Dear Readers~

    Welcome to the latest game I'll be covering for the 2025 NCAA Division 1 Women's Indoor Volleyball season. I chose this game specifically because we have Arizona Sate hosting Utah. Going into this game, Arizona State is ranked #8 while Utah is unranked . The rankings aren't why I chose this game. I chose it because going into this game, Arizona state is 5-0 at home. The only other teams undefeated at home are Nebraska and Texas, both of which are currently undefeated for the season as of the writing of this game. Today's game took place in Tempe, Arizona (part of the Phoenix Metro) at Arizona State's Desert Financial Arena. Going into the game, Utah is 8-6 while Arizona State is 11-2. Arizona State's only loses are to Pittsburg in early September and Texas in mid September. Let's get into this game to see if Arizona State can keep their perfect at home record or if Utah will be the first team of the season to give Arizona State a loss in Tempe.

    For those who have seen my coverage of the NCAA beach games back in the spring, I explained the difference between the beach and indoor games. For those who don't know, the way indoor works is you have to win 3 sets, whether it be all 3, or 3 of the 4/5 sets that are played. As for the scoring, for the beach, it's played first to 21 while indoor is played first to 25 and both require a lead of two points or more for the set to conclude. If a fifth set is needed, the teams play first to 15 instead of 25 but the lead of two points or more is still enforced. Unlike the beach game, you can switch players in and out (the NCAA only gives you 15 per set so you have to use them wisely with 6 players on the court), like in basketball for example, but with beach you can't switch them out and you only get one timeout for each set per team as to where NCAA indoor gets two timeouts per set for each team since they generally play longer sets. Enough about the beach game, let's get into this indoor game from the Phoenix suburb of Tempe.

    The first set ended at 25-16 in favor of Arizona State, giving them a 1-0 lead. The second set ended 25-15, the biggest gap between teams of the game. This second set ended in favor of Arizona State and gave them the 2-0 lead, making them only one set away from giving them their 12th win of the season and keeping that perfect at home record. The third set would end the same as the first one, at 25-16. This set would also end up ending in favor of Arizona State and giving them the 3-0 victory they needed to win the game and give them that 6-0 at home record and an overall record of 12-2. This also gives them a win streak of 6.  Utah now sits at 8-7, with a four-game losing streak against schools including Colorado, Arizona, and Iowa State. These two did end up playing each other again on October 18th in Salt Lake City.

    Let's see who some of the top players of today's game are. The stats that will be looked at include kills, aces, blocks, assists, and digs. The leader in kills goes to Noemie Glover, of Arizona State, with 10, followed by her teammate Bailey Miller, at 9, while the leader for Utah was Emrie Moea'i, with 7. the leader in aces goes to Arizona State's Bailey Miller and Utah's Leah Wilton-Laboy, each with 2. Wilton-Laboy got Utah's only aces while Sydney Henry and Tatum Parrott got one ace each for Arizona State. The leader in blocks goes to Arizona State's Colby Neal, with 6, Bailey Miller and Noemie Glover, each with 2. Utah's leaders for blocks goes to Neea-Maria Joki and Lana Mijacic, each with 2, while Emrie Moea'i had 1 of her own. The leader in assists goes to Arizona State's Sydney Henry and Utah's Isabelle Marco, each with 12, while the second highest Utah's Leah Wilton-Laboy, with 11.     The leader in digs goes to Arizona State's Faith Frame, with 8, Bailey Miller, with 7, and Sydney Henry, with 6. As for Utah, their leaders were Leah Wilton-Laboy and Levan Key-Powell, each with 5, and Kamryn Gibadlo, with 4. When looking at all 5 stats, Arizona State's Bailey Miller is the athlete that shows up the most and coming in with the second most number of kills, most aces, second most blocks, and second most digs on her team for this game. The athlete that shows up the most for Utah is Leah Wilton-Laboy and came out with the only aces for Utah, second most assists, and most digs of anyone on her team.

    With this game concluded and their second matchup of the season over with as of October 18th (resulting in a 3-1 win for Arizona State), let's see who each team will play next. Up next for Arizona State is on October 25th as they head to Tucson to play Arizona at the McKale Memorial Center while Utah's next game is October 29th as they host Kansas State in Salt Lake City's John M. Huntsman Center.

The NCAA giving us the weekly rankings to see how the top 25 teams have been changing over the season. Give them a follow over on Instagram to see if your team makes the list each week: @ncaavolleyball

Arizona State's game week post on their Instagram. Give them a follow over on that platform to see how their season goes: @sundevilvolleyball

The match day post Utah put on their Instagram for the big game against Arizona State in Tempe. Give them a follow over on that platform to see how their season progresses: @utahvolleyball

Arizona State getting the 3-0 sweep against Utah and keeping the perfect at home record

    This concludes today's game of Arizona State hosting Utah in Tempe for the NCAA Women's Indoor Volleyball season. Since this game, Arizona State is still undefeated at home with a record of 8-0 after beating both Baylor (3-0) and Colorado (3-1) in Tempe. With Arizona State slowly climbing the rankings this season, do you think we'll see them in the national championships come December or do you think Utah will make it to the top 25 again like they had last week? Stay tuned for the next game as I cover UCLA hosting USC at Pauley Pavilion in Los Angeles. Who do you think will come out on top of this crosstown rivalry? Stay tuned for next week's game to find out. If there's a team or certain matchup you'd like covered, let me know and until next time, Miller out

~J. Miller