“This tournament has been something else. I mean, it’s just balance, the competitiveness, seemingly every single match and then the number of five-setters that have already happened, barely halfway through. It’s just, it’s unbelievable.”
What Wisconsin coach Kelly Sheffield said.
We got what we wanted — well, not those who arrived early at the Devaney Center who were rooting for the upset — albeit a couple of rounds early, when Nebraska will play Sheffield’s Wisconsin on Sunday for a spot in the national semifinals.
Friday’s four round-of-16 matches went to form, but not without the twists and turns that have made this NCAA Tournament so exciting and unpredictable.
Nonetheless … Creighton ended Texas’s two-year hold on the NCAA volleyball championship trophy, Penn State got past Marquette, Wisconsin survived a tremendous effort by Logan Lednicky and Texas A&M, and Nebraska took care of Dayton.
On Saturday, Pittsburgh, the top seed in its regional, will play host to third-seeded Kentucky at 5 p.m. Eastern. Then Louisville, the top-seed in its regional, plays second-seeded Stanford in a 7:30 p.m. match that should be in Palo Alto because Stanford should have been the fourth seed overall and Louisville the No. 5.
On Sunday, which will provide tremendous TV coverage for the sport, Nebraska, the No. 1 seed in its regional, plays host to second-seeded Wisconsin at 3 p.m. on ABC. At 8:30 p.m. on ESPN, Penn State, the No. 1 seed in its regional, is home for the second seed, Creighton. The latter presents an unfortunate situation in that two of the most well-liked and respected coaches in the game, who happen to be women and moms, go up against each other in Penn State’s Katie Schumacher-Cawley and Creighton’s Kirsten Bernthal Booth. The only other woman coach left is Louisville’s Dani Busboom Kelly.
Also in this NCAA edition of Volleyball Today, there were two more upsets in Division II as Saturday’s title match is set between fourth-seeded Lynn and seventh-seeded San Francisco State; the NIVC has its second semifinal when Bowling Green plays St. John’s for the right to play Arizona; and the coaching carousel spun at Cincinnati, where Molly Alvey is out after 13 years:
NCAA Tournament Saturday
Pittsburgh (32-1), which has won 17 matches in a row and survived a five-setter with Oregon on Thursday, plays Kentucky (23-7), which has won 14 in a row and got past Missouri.
Pitt won the ACC and in the tournament swept Morehead State and Oklahoma before coming away with a 25-19, 24-26, 25-16, 21-25, 15-12 victory over Oregon. Pitt, which has been to the last four national semifinals, is in a regional final for the fifth year in a row.
Kentucky, which won the SEC and is the league’s last team standing after nine got in, swept Cleveland State, beat Minnesota in four, and then came away with a 25-20, 25-20, 16-25, 25-13 victory over Missouri.
Pitt and Kentucky did not play this season.
The nightcap pits two ACC teams that split their regular-season matches. Louisville (28-5) swept visiting Stanford (28-4) on September 29 in the KFC Yum! Center, site of next week’s NCAA Division I Volleyball Championship. But Saturday’s match is in Louisville’s Freedom Hall, because the Yum Center was unavailable. In the rematch, at Stanford to end the regular season, the Cardinal beat the Cardinals 25-23, 25-22, 27-29, 27-25.
In the NCAA Tournament, Louisville sept Chicago State, escaped Northern Iowa in five and swept Purdue in one of the more dominant performances of the tourney.
Stanford, which has won 12 in a row, swept Sacramento State and Loyola Marymount before beating Florida in four.
NCAA Tournament Friday
CREIGHTON 3, TEXAS 1: Creighton (32-2), the Big East champion, won its 25th match in a row by overpowering the two-time defending champions 24-26, 25-19, 25-21, 25-20. Texas, which ended its season 20-7, failed to make a regional final for just the second time in 19 seasons.
Creighton, which hit .307, got 15 kills apiece from its tremendous outside hitters Norah Sis and Ava Martin. Martin hit just .190, but had an assist, an ace, three digs and two blocks. Sis hit .227 and had an assist, four aces, 13 digs and three blocks. Freshman right side Jaya Johnson was overpowering, coming up with nine kills with one error in 12 attacks to hit .667 ad she had two digs and four blocks. Kiara Reinhardt had nine kills, hit .438, and had eight blocks, one solo. Elise Goetzinger had seven kills, hit .333, and had a dig and three blocks.
Setter Kendra Wait had five kills with one error in eight attempts, 47 assists, 17 digs and a block. Libero Maddy Bilinovic had nine digs, two assists and an ace. Creighton had eight aces and 10 serving errors.
Madi Skinner, the 2023 VolleyballMag national player of the year, led Texas with 23 kills but had 11 errors. She had an ace and 12 digs. Marianna Singletary had 11 kills and hit .304 and had an assist and a dig. Ayden Ames had eight kills with one error to hit .538 and had two blocks and Reagan Rutherford had five kills and a dig. Skinner, Rutherford and Goetzinger played together on the 2020/spring 2021 Kentucky team that won the national championship.
Texas. which hit .197, got 41 assists from Averi Carlson, who had nine digs. Libero Emma Halter had 16 digs and four assists. Texas had three aces and five errors.
PENN STATE 3, MARQUETTE 1: Penn State of the Big Ten improved to 32-2 with its 25-15, 25-21, 24-26, 25-20 over Marquette (25-9) of the Big East.
Marquette had no answer for Penn State outsides Camryn Hannah and Jess Mruzik. Hannah led with 24 kills and hit .476 to go with an ace, four digs and a solo block. Mruzik had 20 kills, two assists, an ace and 13 digs.
Taylor Trammel had nine kills with one error in 17 attacks to hit .471 and had two assists and four digs. Caroline Jurevicius had five kills, five digs and three blocks. Ava Falduto had 11 digs, five assists and four aces. Izzy Starck had three kills, 43 assists, 13 digs and three blocks. The Nittany Lions hit .280.
Marquette, which finished its season 25-9, which included three losses in the Big East to Creighton got 14 kills from Natalie Ring, who had an assist, two digs and a block. Aubrey Hamilton had 12 kills, two assists, an ace, five digs and two blocks, one solo. Carsen Murray had seven kills with no errors in 17 swings, a dig and two blocks. Hattie Bray had six kills, two digs and four blocks, two solo. Molly Berezowitz had 18 digs and an assist, and Yadira Anchante had a kill, 35 assists, 15 digs and a block. Her team hit .210.
WISCONSIN 3, TEXAS A&M 2: Wisconsin (26-6) of the Big Ten earned every point of a remarkably hard-fought, heavyweight battle victory over Texas A&M (21-8). Even up 13-9 in the fifth Wisconsin had to muster all it had to hold off the Aggies, led by Logan Lednicky, to come away with the 25-21,18-25, 25-19, 23-25, 15-13 win.
Sarah Franklin led Wisconsin with 21 kills and had two aces, two blocks and eight digs. Carter Booth had 14 kills, hit .444, and added an assist, a dig and nine blocks. Anna Smrek had 10 kills, an assist, five digs and also nine blocks. Julia Orzol had eight kills, an assist, two blocks and nine digs. Lola Schumacher had 24 digs, five assists and an ace, and setter Charlie Feurbringer had three kills in seven errorless tries, 56 assists a block and 12 digs. Her team hit .257.
How Texas A&M finished 10-8 in the SEC with its talent is mystifying. The Aggies certainly didn’t play like it did Friday all season. Lednicky led with 23 kills, 18 digs and seven blocks, and when it mattered the lefty was unstoppable. In the fifth, after Wisconsin went up 13-9, A&M sided out with a kill by setter Maddie Waak, her second with no errors in six tries. She had 56 assists, a block and eight digs. Back-to-back kills by Lednicky got the Aggies to 13-12, Booth got a kill for Wisconsin, but Waak, Lednicky and Ava Underwood blocked Franklin. Franklin finally ended it with a kill, and none of that description does justice to the long rallies and intensity from both teams all match and particularly at the end.
Emily Hellmuth had 14 kills but the same number of errors and had two aces, two blocks and 10 digs. Morgan Perkins had 13 kills in 23 errorless attacks to hit .565 and had three blocks and three digs. Ifenna Cos-Okpalla had eight kills with one error in 18 swings, five digs and 10 blocks, three solo. Taylor Humphrey had ight kills, two blocks and three digs.
NEBRASKA 3, DAYTON 1: Nebraska (32-2) of the Big Ten ousted spunky Dayton (31-3) of the Atlantic 10 25-17, 25-18, 25-27, 25-13 to get to a regional final for the 33rd time and 12th time in 13 seasons.
Harper Murray feasted on the Flyers with a career-high 22 kills while hitting .318 to go with an assist, a match-high four of Nebraska’s seven aces, 16 digs and four blocks. Rebekah Allick had 10 kills, hit .368, and had four blocks. Andi Jackson had eight kills and seven blocks. Bergen Reilly had two kills in three errorless tries, 47 assists, an ace and four blocks. Her team hit .216.
Dayton hit .087. Lexie Almodovar capped her tremendous career with 20 kills but hit .132. She got 12 of her kills with no errors in the third set.
SF State vs. Lynn for the DII crown
Seventh-seeded San Francisco State (26-6) goes for its first national title when the Gators play third-seeded Lynn (32-3) on Saturday in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. The 6 p.m. Eastern first serve can be seen on ESPN+.
San Francisco State defeated third-seeded Angelo State 21-25, 25-19, 25-23, 25-22 as four players had 10 or more kills, 19 by Anastacia Garza, who hit .533 and had a block and a dig. Brianna DeBoer had 23 digs and three assists.
Angelo State ended its season 32-3.
Lynn, located in Boca Raton, Florida, improved to 32-3 with its 25-21, 25-15, 25-18 victory over eighth-seeded Bentley (26-7). Bentley got there by upsetting top-seeded Ferris State on Thursday. Lynn, which hit .342, got 11 kills each from Samantha Wolf and Fabia Gonzalez Stanton. Wolf had one error in 31 attacks to hit .323 and had two blocks and 11 digs, and Gonzalez Stanton had one error in 25 attacks to hit .400 and had an assist, an ace and also 11 digs. Isabelle Gentile had 17 digs and 10 assists and setter Ula Gorjup had five kills in six errorless tries, 31 assists, two aces, a block and 10 digs.
Arizona awaits BGSU-St. John’s winner in NIVC final
Arizona of the Big 12 (23-9) advanced to the title match on Thursday with a four-set win over Northern Colorado.
The Wildcats play the winner of Saturday’s match between Bowling Green (24-9) of the MAC at St. John’s (24-12) of the Big East. They haven’t played since 1998. The match will be streamed on FloVolleyball.
Bowling Green advanced with victories over Binghamton, Wright State and DePaul. St. John’s ousted North Carolina A&T, Virginia and UConn.
Cincinnati needs a volleyball coach
Cincinnati became the third Power 4 program with an opening (UCF, NC State) when it announced Friday that Molly Alvey won’t be back after 13 years.
Alvey went 201-186 at Cincinnati and took the Bearcats to the NCAA Tournament three times, the last in 2019. This season, the team finished 14-15, 5-13 in the Big 12.
Among the players Alvey coached two was two-time Olympian Jordan Thompson. This past September Alvey interviewed Thompson when she visited campus. It’s well worth a watch:
