Besides choosing what type of attack to use or where to block, another type of decision happens to start the rally:

What type of serve should be hit.

The Panthers currently have three different types of serves they use, a jump serve, a jump floater or a standing floater.

“Those are the three types of serves that we do and it depends on their success at the types as to what type we’re doing,” said head coach Lori Bennett.

This weekend, the Panthers will be given multiple opportunities to use all three as they face Ohio Valley Conference opponents Morehead State and Eastern Kentucky on the road.

Eastern Kentucky’s head coach Lori Duncan said the team still mainly uses standing serves.

“Most often we use a floater,” Duncan said. “A couple jump serve but not many.”

The normal jump serve differs from the jump floater by how the ball is hit.

While the jump floater generally has little to no spin on the ball, the jump serve adds spin.

“The jump server has a top spin, generally speaking, so we call it a jumper,” Bennett said. “The jump floater doesn’t spin at all. It travels through the air with no spin and when it does that it catches currents of air in the facility and those air currents can push the ball around various places.”

The standing floater does the same thing that the jump floater does, but the hit is much less powerful just standing.

The serve from the jump floater is also harder to return because of a higher trajectory, Bennett said.

While both serves are hit the same way, the jump version adds a lot more movement to the serve.

“For the floater you’re standing on the ground, and for the jump floater you do a spike approach and then toss it,” Bennett said.

Currently, freshman outside hitter Jessica Wheeler uses the jump floater.

She said her consistency has still been lacking from the serves, though.

“They’re trying to change up my technique a little bit, but other then that it’s doing good,” Wheeler said.

Many club teams and some collegiate teams have gone to the jump floater serve, as it is harder to return.

Bennett has been surprised, though, by how little the competition this year has used it, though.

“Still a lot of players are on the ground or when they do jump there’s a lot of top spin.a jumper,” Bennett said.

Duncan said Eastern Kentucky has been more conservative with jump serves.

She is pleased with of the fact that they have had more aces this year than in previous years.

“It’s (serving) been a lot better then it has in the past,” Duncan said. “For the most part we’re working on being more consistent.”

Overall, the Panthers serving have been improving in practice, Bennett said.

“We’re getting more efficient at it and more effective,” she said. “We’re making more and missing less for the most part in practice every day.”