With the regular season ending in under a month, most teams have played somewhere in the vicinity of 20 matches. We’ve seen many familiar faces continue to perform at a high level, while others have stepped up into an elevated role or are making their mark as a freshman. Based on match outcomes and statistics, I’ve put together my predictions for the SEC’s post-season honors.

Individual Awards

Let’s start with the individual awards. Assuming these are the same as last year, I’ve made my predictions for Player of the Year, Freshman of the Year, Libero of the Year, and Coach of the Year. I’ve also added in Setter of the Year, because even though the SEC hasn’t historically named one, I think that’s silly. And since these are my picks, I get to make the rules.

SEC Player of the Year: Torrey Stafford, Texas

This is a really difficult award to pin down, as there are several directions the voters could go in. I narrowed my focus down to Stafford and then both of Kentucky’s outside hitters, Brooklyn DeLeye and Eva Hudson. All three have been exceptional players and made a huge difference for their respective teams, but Stafford stands out due to her hitting percentage (.333) and her digs per set (2.6). 

Stafford is a player who does it all for Texas. Overall and per set, she leads the team in kills and aces, and is second on the team in digs. While her passing hasn’t been quite as steady as it was in her previous season at Pitt, she’s still been solid on that front as well, and makes up for any subpar passes with her outstanding defense. She’s had double-digit kills in all but two matches so far (both of the other matches were sweeps in which she had nine kills) and has had double-digit digs in nine matches. What might be most impressive about Stafford is her ability to score when the team’s back is against the wall; in Texas’ five-set matches against Stanford early in the season, Texas was down as many as five points in the fifth set until Stafford scored four kills in five points to help Texas take the lead and eventually win the set.

Again, this award could absolutely go the way of DeLeye or Hudson and I would support it; I can also see a co-player of the year situation if the voters are as conflicted as I am. But after playing second-fiddle to Olivia Babcock while at Pitt, it would be quite fitting for Stafford to get this kind of recognition.

SEC Freshman of the Year: Cari Spears, Texas

This award also ended up being tough—more than I expected it to be, anyway. There are three freshmen who really stand out as deserving of this award: Spears, Kentucky’s Kassie O’Brien, and Mississippi State’s Lindsey Mangelson. But while Mangelson’s team-leading 5.08 points per set is undoubtedly impressive and O’Brien has done an excellent job stepping into the starting setter role for Kentucky, it’s Spears whose 3.51 kills per set on a .308 efficiency strike me as most likely to earn her the award. If Mangelson played for a top-25 team, she’d likely earn the award, and I could certainly see O’Brien getting the nod as well—but I would argue that she’s had a bit of an easier time than most freshman setters would have considering she has two of the best outsides in the country on her team. 

Don’t get me wrong though—Spears is more than deserving of this award herself. She came to Texas having never played on the right side, and yet she’s earned herself a starting role as a six-rotation opposite hitter and done a phenomenal job in the process. Something I find particularly impressive about Spears is her composure; there have been several matches where she’s dug herself a big hole in terms of hitting efficiency in the first set, but she doesn’t let it get to her head and often makes up for early errors with high-impact kills that end up balancing out her overall percentage for the match.

SEC Setter of the Year: Kassie O’Brien, Kentucky

Historically, SEC post-season honors have not included a setter of the year award, but I have decided to ignore that because I don’t think that makes any sense. If they decide to include this category this year, I imagine it will go one of two ways: to O’Brien, as is my main prediction, or to Maddie Waak of Texas A&M.

I’m giving O’Brien the edge because she’s been named SEC Setter of the Week five times and has set Kentucky to a .290 efficiency. That’s not much higher than Texas A&M’s efficiency of .285, but it is the second highest in the conference behind Texas’ .307. Given that Waak leads the country in assists per set, however, I could see voters selecting her or the award being split between the two of them.

SEC Libero of the Year: Maya Sands, Missouri

Finally, an easy one. For the third year in a row, I can’t see this going to anyone but Sands. She currently leads the SEC in digs per set with 4.66, and the second best in that category is half a dig behind her at 4.16. Missouri may not be having its best season, but Sands is an absolute phenomenon in the back row, digging up just about everything and making serve reception look easy.

Half the time I watch Missouri play, I end up just watching Sands and admiring how well she positions herself and the microscopic but critical adjustments she makes in order to keep her team in the point. Beyond her defense, she’s also a solid secondary setter and contributes points with her tough serve, which has earned 28 aces so far.

SEC Coach of the Year: Jamie Morrison

Like with some of the other awards, I could see this going in all sorts of different ways, but since I have to make a guess, I’m going with Morrison. In his third year leading the team, Morrison has led the Aggies to the team’s highest ever national ranking of #6 and was the first coach whose team took down Texas this season. That said, Texas coach Jerritt Elliott has done an excellent job making a highly competitive team using several freshman and sophomore starters, so I could see the award going his way as well, especially given the success that Texas has enjoyed after a rocky season. Kentucky’s Craig Skinner, who received the honor last year, is also a viable option. 

All-Conference Teams

Compiling these teams was hard, because the SEC has been rather stingy in how many players it includes. Last year was the first year that it even had a second team (likely due to the expanded number of programs in the conference), and there were only 16 athletes on the first team and 10 on the second. That might sound like a lot, but there are so many stellar players in the conference that it made narrowing these lists down quite the challenge. I’ve exceeded last year’s numbers in both the all-conference lists, but did manage to keep the all-freshman team to seven. I’m sure some of these players will end up being left off, but I couldn’t bring myself to be the one to cut them—which I guess is one such benefit of this all being make-believe.

First Team All-SEC

1. Jaela Auguste, MB, Florida
2. Bianna Muoneke, OH, Georgia
3. Brooklyn DeLeye, OH, Kentucky
4. Eva Hudson, OH, Kentucky
5. Kassie O’Brien, S, Kentucky
6. Jurnee Robinson, OH, LSU
7. Lindsey Mangelson, OH, Mississippi State
8. Caylen Alexander, OH, Missouri
9. Maya Sands, L, Missouri
10. Tyrah Ariail, MB, Missouri
11. Alexis Shelton, OH, Oklahoma
12. Gabi Placide, OPP, Ole Miss
13. Hayden Kubik, OH, Tennessee
14. Torrey Stafford, OH, Texas
15. Ifenna Cos-Okpalla, MB, Texas A&M
16. Logan Lednicky, OPP, Texas A&M
17. Maddie Waak, S, Texas A&M
18. Jackie Moore, MB, Vanderbilt

If the First Team once again only has 16 players, I wouldn’t be surprised if any of Muoneke, Mangelson, one of the Missouri players (aside from Sands), or Moore was cut due to overall team performance. That said, I’ll be pretty outraged on Moore’s behalf if she isn’t on the First Team simply because Vanderbilt isn’t a top contender in its first season in over four decades. A middle with 3.49 points per set on a .351 efficiency is simply too good to leave off, in my opinion. Additionally, if Mangelson is held back because of Mississippi State’s lackluster conference record, that would be a pretty major snub considering she’s one of four players exceeding five points per set.

Second Team All-SEC

1. Lauren Dreves, OH, Auburn
2. Alec Rothe, MB, Florida
3. Jordyn Byrd, OH, Florida
4. Lizzie Carr, MB, Kentucky
5. KJ Burgess, MB, Oklahoma
6. Cammy Niesen, L, Ole Miss
7. Caroline Kerr, S, Tennessee
8. Chelsea Sutton, MB, Tennessee
9. Cari Spears, OPP, Texas
10. Ella Swindle, S, Texas
11. Emma Halter, L, Texas
12. Kyndal Stowers, OH, Texas A&M

Again, this list is unlikely to be larger than ten players. I feel pretty strongly that Rothe, Burgess, Kerr, Spears, and Halter will be on this list, but beyond that, it’s hard to pinpoint what direction the eventual team will go in. Also—I recognize that naming Spears the conference’s Freshman of the Year but having her on the second team while fellow freshman Kassie O’Brien is on the first team doesn’t make a lot of sense. But that’s just what my gut told me to do, so here we are.

All-Freshman Team

1. Lily Hayes, L, Florida
2. Kassie O’Brien, S, Kentucky
3. Lindsey Mangelson, OH, Mississippi State
4. Keirstyn Carlton, MB, Ole Miss
5. Zoe Humphrey, MB, Tennessee
6. Abby Vander Wal, OH, Texas
7. Cari Spears, OPP, Texas

This was the most straightforward team to compile. I can see a world in which Texas’ Taylor Harvey makes this list over Carlton or Humphrey, but considering Vander Wal and Spears feel like locks, I thought it was more likely that a player from a different team would make the cut. Another player who may have a case to make this list is Arkansas’ Parker Duncan, who leads her team with 3.68 points per set, but the team has been struggling enormously and her hitting percentage is barely above .200, so I’m expecting her to be overlooked.