NCAA Women
NCAA volleyball round of 16 set as Stanford survives, seven others also advance
December 3, 2023
16 NCAA DI volleyball teams unbeaten as Utah rallies past Nebraska, Minnesota tops Oregon
NCAA Women
September 12, 2021
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Unbeatens?
They fell in bunches the past two days, and by the time Sunday rolled around, just 16 of the more than 330 NCAA Division I women’s volleyball teams were still undefeated as the third weekend headed to a close.
At Nebraska, something had to give, since both the third-ranked Huskers and No. 20 Utah were 6-0, but who could have imagined the Utes coming away with a reverse sweep in Lincoln?
Unpredictability?
That was the rule of the day. In Eugene, Minnesota beat previously unbeaten Oregon. USC, which lost in four to Hawai’i on Friday, beat the Rainbow Wahine in four on Saturday. Baylor won at Florida for the second straight day, this time with a dominating sweep.
So who is still undefeated?
Towson (12-0)
Maryland (9-0)
Louisville (8-0)
Ohio State (8-0)
Ole Miss (8-0)
Pittsburgh (8-0)
West Virginia (8-0)
Colorado (7-0)
Miami (FL) 7-0)
North Carolina (7-0)
Utah (7-0)
Dartmouth (6-0)
Texas (6-0)
Auburn (5-0)
Tennessee State (5-0)
Wisconsin (5-0)
There are only 16 matches on Sunday’s schedule, but a few are quite intriguing, including North Carolina vs. Michigan, Sam Houston vs. Rice, Santa Clara at Auburn, and the showcase match of the day, Wisconsin at Marquette.
What follows is a semi-organized collection of notes and highlights of top performances from Thursday, Friday, and Saturday compiled as the weekend unfolded. For more, we invite you to come back to VolleyballMag.com on Monday afternoon for our weekly video chat with Salima Rockwell, Jenny Hazelwood, and Emily Ehman, and this week’s guest, Pac-12 analyst Nicole Rigoni.
UTAH TOPS NEBRASKA — Utah was up 23-21 in the second set and had set point at 24-23, and Nebraska had match point twice in the third set, before Utah rallied for an 18-25, 24-26, 27-25, 25-22, 15-13 victory.
“Once we were in the third set and then battling in the fourth, I thought about what a great situation this is to be in this early in the season,” said Utah coach Beth Launiere, whose team hit minus .031 in the first set and .346 in the fifth.
“We showed great mental composure throughout the fourth and fifth sets. Early in the season you are trying to define yourselves as a team, and this was an incredible opportunity to play a great team and define ourselves in this moment. We defended tremendously and everyone was doing their role. It truly was a team effort tonight.”
VolleyballMag.com first-team All-American Dani Drews led with 27 kills, two assists, an ace, a block, and 16 digs. Zoe Weatheringon had 17 kills, an assist, five blocks, and two digs. Setter Stef Jankiewicz, the senior transfer from Illinois State, had four kills, 50 assists, two aces, a block, and 14 digs. Utah hit .191. She had three assists, three aces, two blocks, and eight digs.
Nebraska, which hit .202, got 15 kills from freshman Lindsay Krause, who hit .317 and had five blocks and three digs. VBM second-team All-American Lexi Sun had eight kills and eight errors — one to end the third set — to hit .000, with no kills in the fifth set. Setter Nicklin Hames had four kills, 39 assists, an ace, and a team-high 17 digs.
OREGON GATHERING — Start with Friday, when Minnesota — coming off defeats to Texas and Florida — beat Stanford, while Oregon swept Penn State.
Minnesota beat Stanford 25-22, 19-25, 25-16, 25-17 as Stephanie Samedy had 20 kills and hit .455 to go with 14 digs and three blocks, one solo. Jenna Wenaas had 14 kills, an assist, seven digs, and three blocks, one solo. Melanie Shaffmaster had three kills, 53 assists, five blocks, and nine digs. Caitie Baird led Stanford with 17 kills, two assists, three aces, nine digs, and three blocks, one solo. Minnesota hit .329, while the Cardinal hit .199.
In the nightcap, Oregon downed Penn State, which hit. 162, 25-17, 25-21, 27-25. Brooke Nuneviller led the Ducks with 10 kills, three aces, a solo block, and seven digs. Oregon hit .223. Jonni Parker had 10 kills for Penn State.
Saturday, the Nittany Lions battled Stanford before losing 21-25, 25-23, 22-25, 26-24, 15-7. Baird went off for 24 kills, two assists, an ace, 10 digs, and three blocks, one solo. Kendall Kipp had 21 kills, hit .326, and had an assist, four blocks, and two digs. Kami Miner had three kills, 56 assists, a block, and 15 digs as her team hit .263. Elena Oglivie had 27 digs, an ace, and four assists. Penn State, which hit .257, got 21 kills from Parker, who had 13 digs and five blocks, two solo. Kaitlyn Hord had 11 kills and seven blocks, one solo. Gabby Blossom had three kills in five errorless tries, 53 assists, two blocks, and a team-high 19 digs.
Finally, Minnesota beat Oregon 25-21, 23-25, 18-25, 25-20, 15-12 as Samedy led again with 20 kills, a block, and 16 digs. Wenaas had 19 kills, an assist, an ace, 11 digs, and four blocks. Shaffmaster had two kills, 38 assists, an ace, 10 digs, and three blocks, one solo, but then was replaced in the fourth set by Bayley McMenimen, who had 13 assists and four digs. Morgan Lewis led Oregon with 15 kills and Taylor Borup had 13 kills, four blocks, and eight digs. Minnesota hit .199, Oregon .191.
The weekend left Oregon 6-1, Minnesota 3-3, Stanford 4-2, and Penn State 5-3.
AROUND THE BIG TEN — Maryland swept Howard and Quinnipiac on Friday and UMBC on Saturday. With Akron, Stony Brook, and Columbia coming to town next weekend, the Terps have a great shot at being 12-0 when the stark reality of the Big Ten season begins …
Ohio State swept James Madison, VCU, and Virginia. Against UVa the Buckeyes hit .311 to hit .300 or better for the sixth match in a row and seventh time this season. Gabby Gonzales led with 14 kills with one error in 29 attacks to go with two assists, two aces, and a match-high 12 digs …
Wisconsin hit .305 and beat visiting Kentucky on Friday 25-17, 25-11, 26-28, 26-24, as Dana Rettke had 16 kills with two errors in 24 swings and four blocks. Kentucky hit .133 …
Purdue, one of those teams that was unbeaten but lost on Friday, bounced back from getting swept by Louisville by sweeping Lipscomb. Purdue, which hit .124 against Louisville, pounded Lipscomb by hitting .444. Caitlyn Newton had 16 kills while hitting .406, Grace Cleveland had 15 kills while hitting .542, and Emma Ellis had 13 kills and hit .600 …
Jess Mruzik had a career-high 31 kills in spectacular fashion as Michigan lost the first two sets at home and then knocked off previously unbeaten Duke 19-25, 21-25, 25-13, 25-12, 15-6 on Saturday. Mruzik had just four errors in 53 attacks to hit .509 and had an assist, an ace, two blocks, and 15 digs … Rutgers, which lost in five to NC State on Friday, improved to 7-2 by beating Brown in three Saturday, its fifth sweep of the season, most for the program since 2012 … Illinois is 5-3 after beating Omaha and SMU on Friday but losing at Creighton on Saturday 25-18, 25-16, 25-27, 33-31. Creighton improved to 9-1 when it swept Omaha later Saturday … Indiana dropped to 5-4 with a five-set loss to Mississippi State on Thursdsay, another five-set defeat to Oklahoma on Friday, and then a four-set loss to the home team, Georgia Tech, later Friday … Northwestern beat Missouri and Wyoming on Friday, but lost to UC Santa Barbara on Saturday at Wyoming … Iowa lost its first six matches but broke the skid with a sweep Saturday over Iowa State. Courtney Buzzerio had 15 kills, hit .308, and had an assist, a block, and four digs, as the Hawkeyes hit .286 … Michigan State’s home matches against North Carolina and Duke were scrapped “due to health and safety protocols.”
PAC-12 — We covered Utah, Stanford and Oregon above, but how about Colorado, off to the best start in program history at 7-0? The Buffs beat Texas Tech in four and swept San Jose State on Friday and then Saturday beat Northern Colorado in four. Leah Clayton totaled 48 kills in the three matches …
UCLA bounced back from its loss at San Diego (recapped below) by sweeping San Diego State to improve to 5-1. Mac May had 14 kills, four blocks, and six digs as the Bruins hit .346 … USC is 4-4 after gaining a split at Hawai’i. Brooke Botkin had 17 kills in the Friday loss and she and Emilia Weske had 16 apiece in the Saturday victory …
Washington beat previously unbeaten Pepperdine on Friday and Cal Poly on Saturday, both in four. Washington hit .439 and won at Pepperdine but the line of the match went to the Waves’ Rachel Ahrens. The 6-foot-4 outside from Trabuco Canyon, California, had 27 kills — giving her 1,002 in her Pepperdine career — hit .380, and had an assist, an ace, a block, and six digs … Claire Hoffman had 17 kills, three blocks, and eight digs against Cal Poly … Arizona State went to Northern Arizona and beat Utah Valley in five and NAU in four on Friday before sweeping UC Davis on Saturday to improve to 6-3. The Sun Devils hit .320 against UC Davis … Cal is also 6-3 but lost to Butler on Saturday … Arizona had a tough trip to Texas, losing to Texas and Notre Dame … Washington State swept Long Beach State and Northern Iowa on Friday and then hit .418 in a sweep of Gonzaga on Saturday. Kalyah Williams had 10 kills, hit .438, and had five blocks, one solo … And Oregon State broke a five-match losing streak by sweeping SIUE.
BIG 12 — Start with Baylor after the Bears went to Gainesville and beat the SEC’s Florida on back-to-back days. Friday Baylor won 27-25, 22-25, 25-18, 25-23 as Yossiana Pressley led with 17 kills, Avery Skinner had 16, and Lauren Harrison had 12. T’Ara Ceasar had 15 kills for Florida and Thayer Hall had 13.
Saturday, Harrison led the 25-19, 25-18, 25-16 victory with 14 kills while hitting .500. Pressley had 13 kills and Skinner nine an four blocks. Kara McGhee, who had seven blocks Friday, had seven more Saturday. Ceasar had 19 kills for Florida, but the rest of her team totaled 18, eight by Hall.
It left Baylor 3-3 (its losses are to Wisconsin, Tennessee, and Pittsburgh), while Florida is 4-3.
“A great team second-night performance.,” Baylor coach Ryan McGuyre said. “We feel the better team wins on night two so I’m really proud of our girls.
“As far as listening to the adjustments that we made, I thought (setter) Hannah Sedwick did a phenomenal job with her decisions and her set location. We were able to take some swings and show them some different looks offensively that opened it up and had us hitting at a much higher percentage tonight than we did the night before. I’m also proud of the adjustments we made on defense to slow them down and limit them a little bit more. I thought we served so much better to challenge them. We were able to keep the pressure on from the first point forward.”
West Virginia stayed unbeaten with a four-set win at Buffalo. Four players had 11 or more kills, including Briana Lynch with 15 and no errors in 32 attacks to go with eight blocks, one solo … Iowa State beat Ball State and previously unbeaten Syracuse on Friday before falling to Iowa on Saturday and is 6-2. Eleanor Holthaus had 41 kills in the wins but five in the loss … Kansas State is 6-2 after sweepting Ohio on Thursday and beating Loyola in five on Friday and Fresno State in five on Saturday .. Kansas had a sweep weekend, beating Delaware, Wichita State, and Kent State in three on consecutive days to improve to 5-3 .. TCU is also 5-3 after sweeping Louisiana Tech and North Florida before losing to Houston Baptist in five despite having 10 more kills and a higher hitting percentage … And Oklahoma is 4-4 and plays at Georgia Tech on Sunday.
ACC — Four league teams are unbeaten, and that includes Louisville after its big sweep of Purdue on Friday. The Cardinals followed that with a sweep of Xavier on Saturday. Anna DeBeer had 12 kills, an assist, an ace, a block, and 12 digs against Purdue, which hit .124. Claire Chaussee led Louisville with 17 kills, making one error in 24 swings. DeBeer did not play in the match. Louisville hit .425, while Xavier hit .045 …
Pitt capped a big Friday in which it swept High Point and beat BYU in four with a sweep of Bowling Green on Saturday. Against previously unbeaten BYU, Chinazee Ndee led with 17 kills as she hit .359 and had two blocks. Erin Livingston had 17 kills and hit .441 for BYU and had two blocks and two digs … North Carolina had its match at Michigan State canceled on Friday so it ended up beating another league team, Duke, at Michigan … Unbeaten Miami went to Texas State and swept the home team Friday and then the SEC’s Alabama on Saturday …
Syracuse took its first loss Friday at Iowa State but swept Ball State on Saturday. In a win over Iowa Thursday, three Syracuse players, Marina Markova (20 kills), Polina Shemanova (16 kills), and Viktoriia Lokhmanchuk (12 kills) combined for 48 of the 59 kills for the Orange. Markova and Shemanova are from St. Petersburg, Russia, and Lokhmanchuck is from the Ukraine. On Friday, in the five-set loss to Iowa State, Shemanova had 26 kills and 14 digs, Lokhmanchuk had 18 kills and four blocks, and Markova had 14 kills. Then against Ball State, Shemanova had 20 more kills, Markova had 16, and Lokhmanchuk didn’t play …
Florida State beat Georgia in five on Thursday, lost to UCF in five on Saturday, and swept FGCU on Saturday … Boston College got off to an 8-0 start before losing to St. John’s and Rachele Rastini (more below). The Eagles bounced back with a four-set win over Fordham on Saturday and play Rhode Island on Sunday … Georgia Tech plays Oklahoma on Sunday.
Virginia is 4-3 afer beating VCU on Friday and getting swept by Ohio State on Saturday. The Cavaliers, who cut their season short last spring after going 2-12, have twice the victories already.
SEC — Kentucky lost in four at Wisconsin on Friday and swept at Marquette on Saturday. Against Marquette, the Wildcats hit .310 as Madi Skinner had 16 kills, hit .400, and had an ace, a block, and 13 digs. Taylor Wolf and Hope Werch had 13 kills each for Marquette, and Savannah Rennie had seven kills, six digs, an ace, and four blocks, two solo …
How about Ole Miss? The Rebels won twice at WKU Friday, first beating UT Martin in four and then improved to 7-0 by upsetting No. 15 Western Kentucky. This is a team that lost its last 12 matches of the 2019 season and then last spring, under new coach Kayla Banwarth, went 1-19. So 7-0 with a win over WKU is pretty special.
What’s more, WKU opened Friday with a sweep of winless Samford, its 54th regular-season victory in a row.
Against WKU, Payton Brgoch, a 6-foot-3 sophomore from Parker, Colorado, had 16 kills, hit .393, and had an ace, two digs, and six blocks, one solo. Sasha Ratliff, a 6-2 sophomore from Atlanta and daughter of 16-year NBA veteran Theo Ratliff, had 15 kills with one error in 23 swings and nine blocks, one solo. Ole Miss hadn’t beaten a top-15 team since 2010. Then Saturday in a four-set win over Samford, Anna Bair had 13 kills, Brgoch 12 and nine blocks, and Lauren Thompson had 10 kills …
Tennessee swept at Morehead State on Friday and plays host to the same team Sunday … Unbeaten Auburn is home for Santa Clara … Mississippi State is 7-2 after beating Indiana and losing to Georgia Tech on Thursday before beating Oklahoma on Friday …
Arkansas improved to 8-1 with a four-set win over Stephen F. Austin as Jillian Gillen had 21 kills and hit .326 with an assist, an ace, 10 digs, and three blocks … Amber Stivrins had 23 kills as Georgia beat UCF in five, but the line of the match went to McKenna Melville, the UCF star who had 30 kills while hitting .366. She had an assist, three aces, 10 digs, and three blocks. More on her below in Friday’s recap.
SATURDAY HAPPENINGS — Towson is 12-0 after sweeping Temple and Norfolk State on Saturday. We featured Towson and coach Don Metil last week … Crieghton is 9-1. The Bluejays swept Omaha with just 36 kills … San Diego followed its win over UCLA with a four-set victory over San Diego State. Victoria Sullivan had 19 kills, hit .349, and had an assist and four digs …
Crystal Burk had 23 kills for South Dakota State in a five-set win over Youngstown State. She hit .333 and had two assists, three aces, 20 digs, and a solo block. Youngstown’s Paula Gursching had 21 kills, two assists, 11 digs, and three blocks, one solo … Northern Illinois setter Grace Balensiefer had 55 assists in a four-set win over Charleston Southern to go with an ace, six digs, and a block … Evansville was 7-0 before losing in four Saturday to Northern Kentucky (3-3) despite 26 kills by the Purple Aces’ Alondra Vazquez. She hit .400 and had three assists, a block, and 18 digs in the losing cause … Davidson beat Campbell in five and Hattie Rodriguez had 26 kills, an ace, 15 digs, and two blocks … Lafayette of Easton, Pennsylvania, lost to Fairfield in four but Leanna Deegan had 23 kills, two aces, five digs, and three blocks, one solo. On Friday, Lafayette lost in five to Sacred Heart but Deegan, a 5-9 senior playing for her hometown college, had 36 kills, hit .418, and had an assist, an ace, and 14 digs … Andrea Tsvetanova set a Coppin State record for the most assists in a three-set match against a non-conference team, tallying 41 in a 25-23, 25-20, 25-16 sweep of George Mason …
51 kills! That was on Friday as St. John’s not only defeated Fordham and previously unbeaten Boston College, both in five, but Italian outside Rachele Rastelli was on fire. The 6-foot-4 right side from Parma had 20 kills, five blocks, and nine digs against Fordham, and came back with 31 more kills against BC. She hit .424 and had a block and 14 digs. Then Saturday in a sweep of Army West Point, she had 14 more kills, hit .455, and had eight digs and three blocks … Kelsey Bennett had 22 kills, an ace, 13 digs, and a block for Louisiana in a five-set loss to UIW. More on her in Thursday’s recap … Marist beat Robert Morris in five as Madelyn Waumans had 24 kills, an ace, and 20 digs, and Marist had 89 digs, 20 from Morgan Owens and 19 from Jillian Hanna, daughter of former Marist coach and current Akron coach Tom Hanna … Harvard lost to Northeastern in five but Harvard’s Jaimie Rao had 22 kills, hit .340, and had three digs, and four blocks … Boise State is 8-1 after sweeping Sacramento State. Lauren Ohlinger had 15 kills, hit .419, and had an ace, five digs, and two blocks.
FRIDAY’S POTPOURRI — Start with the previously unbeatens.
The following entered Friday without a defeat and all lost: Western Kentucky, Syracuse, Purdue, Houston, Boston College, Duke, Memphis, Pepperdine, Ball State, Penn, Oral Roberts, Liberty, UTEP, Grand Canyon, Florida Gulf Coast, Florida Atlantic, and CSU Bakersfield.
After Friday, the only unbeaten teams left were: Towson, Maryland, New Mexico, Evansville, Ole Miss, Pittsburgh, West Virginia, Colorado, Marquette, Miami (FL), Nebraska, Ohio State, Oregon, Texas, Auburn, Tennessee State, Utah, Wisconsin, and Dartmouth (thanks to vballfreak808 on VolleyTalk for the updated list) …
New Mexico improved to 8-0 for the first time since 2008 with victories Friday over Southeastern Louisiana and Seattle, but then got swept by UC San Diego on Saturday …
Wright State, which earlier Friday swept Central Michigan, went down 0-2 and came back to win at Dayton 18-25, 13-25, 25-18, 25-23, 16-14. Wright State won despite hitting .130 and having 49 kills, 20 fewer than Dayton. Jamie Peterson had 27 kills for Dayton. Peterson hit .300 and had an assist, six blocks, and six digs. Wright State lost to Illinois State in five on Saturday …
Southeast Missouri beat previously unbeaten Memphis in five as Laney Malloy, a senior from Roselle, Illinois, had 25 kills, an assist, an ace, and 23 digs …
Friday was a big day for Akron at DePaul, as the Zips improved to 5-2 by beating Penn in four and then the home team in five. Teagan Ochaya, a 6-3 senior from Mentor, Ohio, had 20 kills with four errors in 50 swings against DePaul to go with an assists, an ace, eight digs, and three blocks, one solo. Teammate Taylor Sharrits became the school’s all-time digs leader … LIU beat Jacksonville in five as Jovana Stekovic, a graduate student from Serbia, had 24 kills, hit .339, and added an assist, and 17 digs …
Ball State was 7-0 entering Friday but took its first loss by falling in four to Iowa State before then beating winless Iowa in five …
UCF and McKenna Melville swept two in-state opponents on Friday, going four to deal Florida Gulf Coast its first loss, and then beating Florida State in five.
“It has been a banner day,” UCF coach Todd Dagenais said. “Beating a tough Florida Gulf Coast team who was undefeated and hadn’t even had a set taken off them to then go out and beat Florida State was the jewel on the crown. I am really proud of our team. It is a great confidence booster heading into tomorrow.”
Melville, a 6-1 senior from Egan, Minnesota, had 16 kills and nine digs against FGCU and then 27 kills, three assists, three aces, two blocks, and 28 digs against FSU. UCF was set to play Georgia on Saturday …
FAU fell to 7-1 after beating Norfolk State before getting swept by Towson, featured here last week.
Alexis Mareko had 10 blocks for USC Upstate, one solo, in its four-set win over Alabama State. Teammate Emma McElveen had eight blocks … Riley Homer had 25 kills and hit .449 for Villanova in a five-set win over Northeastern as the 6-2 sophomore from Grand Rapids, Michigan, had an assist, an ace, 10 digs, and five blocks, one solo … Nicole Adams had 23 kills for Saint Francis (PA) in a five-set victory over winless Siena. She hit .386 and had an ace, five digs, and five blocks. But then Central Connecticut got 46 kills out of Madi Tyus (24 kills) and Nicole Adams (22) for its first victory after seven losses in a five-set win over Saint Francis …
Grand Canyon, featured here last week, got 22 kills from McKenzie Wise, who hit .391 and had an ace, five digs, and three blocks, two solo, in a four-set win over previously unbeaten UTEP. But then GCU lost to Portland State while UTEP swept Portland. Portland State got 25 kills from Makayla Lewis against GCU and 22 from Parker Webb …
Eastern Illinois has more wins already than the last two years combined as it beat Southern Illinois in five as Danielle Allen had 22 kills, hit .487, and had 11 digs and four blocks and then EIU improved to 6-1 with a sweep of Alabama State as Allen had 22 more kills, hitting .341, with an ace, a block, and three digs. EIU won three matches in 2019 and two last spring …
Long Beach State won in five over Gonzaga as Kashauna Williams had 22 kills and hit .500, but the line of match went to Kennedy Croft of Gonzaga, who had 27 kills with three errors in 52 attacks to hit .462 to go with an assist, an ace, and six digs. The Beach later lost to Northern Iowa … Hayley Mcluskey had 25 kills for CSU Bakersfield in its five-set win over Utah State. McCluskey, a 6-foot junior from Rancho Santa Margarita, California, had an assist, four aces, four blocks, and 11 digs. But the Roadrunners then lost in four to St. Mary’s and she hit negative … Dominique Washington had 26 kills for Florida A&M in a four-set loss to the Fighting Camels of Campbell. Washington hit .362 and had 19 digs and two blocks, one solo … Dartmouth got to 4-0 after beating New Hampshire … Elena Montgomery, a junior from Franklin Lakes, N.J., of Prinecton had 20 kills, three assists, 11 digs, and two blocks, one solo in a five-set win over Colgate … Madison Grace, a freshman from Clinton Township, Michigan, had 25 kills and hit .500 for Morgan State as it won for the first time after nine losses, a five-set victory over George Mason … Maddie Wiedenfeld had 11 blocks, one solo, for South Dakota in its five-set win over Milwaukee … Sacramento State beat Pacific in five, but Alexa Edwards, a sophomore from Sacramento, had 27 kills for Pacific to go with an ace, 18 digs, and two blocks, one solo.
THURSDAY TIDBITS — The big one Thursday was the five-set victory by San Diego over visiting UCLA. And, thanks to Laura Grotto, there was a tribute to Ed Chan on the video scoreboard. Ed, the co-publisher and photo editor of VolleyballMag.com, died September 3 in Chicago. By all accounts, USD libero Annie Benbow was spectacular as the 5-3 senior from Frisco, Texas, had 24 digs. The line of the night went to UCLA’s Mac May, the 6-3 outside from Dubuque, Iowa, who had 30 kills, hit .308, and had three aces, nine digs, and three blocks, two solo …
The big performance Thursday was by Georgia’s Kacie Evans in a five-set loss to Florida State. Evans, a 5-11 junior from Wadsworth, Ohio, had 29 kills with eight errors in a whopping 81 swings, two assists, 18 digs, and three blocks.
VCU’s Jasmine Knight, a 6-foot sohomore libero from Phoenix, had 12 kills and eight blocks, two solo, in a four-set win over previously unbeaten James Madison … Rachel Hickman, a 6-3 junior from Lawrence, Kansas, of Northern Colorado had 13 kills in 21 errorless attacks, an assists, an ace, a dig, and two blocks — one solo — in a four-set win over San Jose State …
UTRGV beat visiting Louisiana but the Ragin’ Cajuns’ Kelsey Bennett, a 6-foot junior from Allen, Texas, had 27 kills, an assist, 18 digs, and two blocks, one solo, while UTRGV’s Sarah Cruz, a 6-2 junior from the Czech Republic, had 26 kills, an ace, 11 digs, and two blocks …
Also Thursday, Camryn Luginbuhl, a 6-foot freshman from Tolland, Connecticut, had 22 kills and hit .543 as Hartford improved to 2-5 with a sweep of Merrimack.
WINLESS — Thanks again to vballfreak808 for this update, too, of the teams that have yet to win:
