Wisconsin sweeps Nebraska, Illini upset Penn St., Florida tops Auburn in NCAA volleyball
NCAA Women
Lee Feinswog
October 27, 2022
Fifth-ranked Wisconsin survived an incredible second-set Nebraska rally and ended up sweeping the visiting top-ranked Huskers on Wednesday night in a Big Ten match that pitted last year’s NCAA finalists.
Illinois gave itself new life with an upset of visiting No. 11 Penn State.
Florida broke the SEC first-place tie as the No. 14 Gators crushed visiting Auburn, No. 16 Marquette had to rally to win its Big East match at DePaul in five, No. 2 Texas hit .506 and held Texas Tech to a total of 36 points in their Big 12 match, and No. 4 Louisville overwhelmed Notre Dame in the ACC.
Recaps and top performances follow.
There are 33 matches on Thursday’s NCAA Division I schedule, including four in the West Conference, where No. 3 San Diego goes to Portland and No. 17 BYU is home for Gonzaga. Gonzaga last week upset Pepperdine, which knocked the Waves out of the top 25. Pepperdine is home for Santa Clara and San Francisco is at Loyola Marymount, which is alone in second place, two games back of San Diego and a game up on BYU in the win column.
The lone Big Ten match has Maryland at Iowa.
UTRGV holds a one-game lead in the WAC and plays host to Stephen F. Austin, which is two games back in third. Second-place Utah Valley, a game behind UTRGV, is at Tarleton State.
League-leading South Dakota is off, but the four Summit League matches include second-place North Dakota State at Kansas City and third-place Omaha at St. Thomas.
Portland State, alone in first in the Big Sky, is home for Northern Arizona.
Big West-leading Hawai’i is at UC Riverside.
UNLV and San Jose State are tied atop the Mountain West at 9-1. UNLV goes to Boise State, while SJSU is at Air Force. Colorado State, a game back, is home for San Diego State.
Co-Southland leaders HCU and McNeese are both home as HCU plays Northwestern State and McNcNeese plays Nicholls. Three teams are tied for third just a game back and one of them has to fall behind Southeastern Louisiana plays host to New Orleans. The other, Texas A&M-Corpus Christi, is home for Texas A&M-Commerce.Â
BIG TEN: Wisconsin’s 25-23, 25-23, 25-18 victory that left the Badgers 16-3 overall and tied with Nebraska (18-2) and Ohio State for the league lead at 10-1. In a fierce defensive battle that saw Wisconsin hit .207 and Nebraska .162, Sarah Franklin had 21 kills for the Badgers. She hit .381 and had a block and six digs. Devyn Robinson had nine kills, six blocks and six digs. Danielle Hart had six kills, hit .364, and had nine blocks. Caroline Crawford had three kills in six errorless tries and Izzy Ashburn had 25 assists, three aces and 10 digs.
Nebraska got 13 kills from Bekka Allick, who had two errors in 17 attempts to go with an assist and two blocks, one solo. Madi Kubik had seven kills, an assist and six digs and Whitney Lauenstein had seven kills, two blocks and five digs. Nicklin Hames had 15 assists and 14 digs.
In the second set Wisconsin built a 22-12 lead but after Nebraska sided out, Hames, while not recording any aces, took the Badgers completely out of their game and the Huskers found new life. Nebraska pulled to 22-20. Jade Demps got a kill to make it 23-20, but Nebraska ran off three in a row — including its only ace of the match, by Kenzie Knuckles — and tied it at 23. Finally, Lauenstein, who hit .037, had an error and then so did Kubik, who hit .100.
This was the first time since the teams played since Wisconsin beat Nebraska in last December’s NCAA title match. They play again November 25 in Lincoln when Wisconsin finishes the regular season with a stretch that has the Badgers going to Rutgers, Penn State, Nebraska and Ohio State …
Illinois improved to 10-11, 5-6 with its 25-19, 25-20, 23-25, 25-23 over visiting Penn State (17-5, 6-5), the Illini’s first win over a ranked team this season. Raina Terry led Illinois with 24 kills as she hit .380 and had an ace, two digs and four blocks, one solo. Kayla Burbage had 10 kills, an assist, four blocks and five digs, and Brooke Mosher had nine kills, an ace, three blocks and nine digs. Rylee Hinton had five kills in nine errorless swings and eight blocks, one solo. Diana Brown had a kill, 41 assists, three blocks and nine digs. Her team hit .300.
Penn State, which hit .220, got 15 kills from Kashauna Williams, who had a solo block. Alexa Markley had 14 kills, hit .333 and had a dig and three blocks, one solo. Zoe Weatherington had 10 kills, hit .353, and had two blocks and a dig …
Sixth-ranked Ohio State (14-5, 10-1) is tied with Wisconsin and Nebraska after its 25-17, 25-21, 25-23 win over visiting Michigan (13-8, 4-7). Ohio State hit .385. Emily Londot led with 13 kills, an assist, an ce, 12 digs and two blocks …Â
No. 9 Minnesota (13-6, 8-3) made short work of visiting Michigan State (10-12, 1-10) as the Gophers hit .326 in the 25-20, 25-14, 25-11 victory. Taylor Landfair led with 13 kills as she hit .321 and had an assist, two aces, three blocks and five digs.
BIG 12: The score is stunning, a 25-18, 25-7, 25-9 victory by Texas (16-1, 8-1) over visiting Texas Tech (14-8, 3-6), which is missing both its setters. Texas hit .506 and got 13 kills from Logan Eggleston, who had no errors in 23 attacks, and 11 kills from Molly Phillips, who had no errors in 15 attacks …Â
No. 13 Baylor (18-4, 7-2) won in four at Oklahoma (11-10, 1-8) as four players had 12 or more kills, 15 by Kara McGhee, who hit .448 and had two assists, three digs and four blocks …Â
Iowa State (15-7, 7-2) kept pace with a sweep at West Virginia (7-15, 0-9) … and TCU (11-9, 6-3) got a huge five-set win over visiting Kansas (15-6, 5-4), coming back from 0-2 for a remarkable 17-25, 12-25, 25-16, 25-16, 15-9 victory. TCU not only won a reverse sweep for the third time and second in three matches, it matched the best Big 12 start for the program since 2015. Audrey Nalls had 22 kills, an assist, six digs and three blocks, one solo, and Jalyn Gibson had 15 kills, hit .367 and had seven blocks and five digs.Â
AROUND THE NATION: No. 4 Louisville beat visiting Notre Dame in the ACC 25-10, 25-22, 25-14. Claire Chaussee had 16 kills with one error in 34 attacks, an assist and eight digs …Â
No. 14 Florida hit .365 and broke its tie at the top of the SEC with Auburn by winning on the Plains 25-23, 25-18, 25-15. Merritt Beason had 14 kills, hit .440 and had an ace, five digs and three blocks … Also in the SEC, Ole Miss won in four at Mississippi State as Sasha Ratliff had 17 kills and hit .419 to go with three aces and seven blocks, three solo …Â
DePaul (7-16, 3-8 Big East) won the first set 32-30 against visiting No. 16 Marquette (19-2, 10-1) but then the Golden Eagles won 25-18, 25-20, before DePaul won the fourth 25-19. Marquette won the fifth set 15-8. Five Marquette players had nine or more kills, 21 by Hattie Bray. She hit .500 and had three blocks and a dig. Carsen Murray had 17 kills, hit .536 and had eight blocks, one solo, and Aubrey Hamilton had 15 kills, 10 digs and five blocks, one solo. Yadhira Acnhante had 63 assists, three kills, two blocks and 17 digs. DePaul’s Jill Pressly had 21 kills, an assist, an ace, two blocks and 10 digs ...
SMU stayed two games off the American Athletic lead with a sweep at Memphis. Marieke van der Mark had 15 kills with one error in 30 attacks, two digs and a block, and Jamison Wheeler had 13 kills, four aces, 16 digs and a block … Central Arkansas swept its ASUN match at North Alabama as Alexis Stumbough had 15 kills, an assist, two acces, nine digs and a solo block … Bryant swept Merrimack in the America East as 12 players had kills …Â Fairfield improved to 18-6, 12-1 and dropped Siena (11-12, 9-4) into a three-way tie for second, three games back, by beating the visiting Saints in five. KJ Johnson had 16 kills, two assists, 15 digs and six blocks, two solo. Siena had won nine in a row.
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Wisconsin’s Devyn Robinson attacks Izzy Ashburn’s set against Nebraska/Michael Gomez photo
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