Big ACC day ahead; Texas, SE LA, Utah St., Sac St., SFA, Denver, Omaha, Pepperdine win
On Thursday, the NCAA Division I women’s volleyball spotlight shined on some mid-majors who made statements, including Southeastern Louisiana (Southland), Utah State (Mountain West), Sacramento State (Big Sky), Stephen F. Austin (WAC) and Denver and Omaha (The Summit League).
Pepperdine continued its West Coast Conference dominance and No. 5 Texas won at West Virginia.
Friday the focus is on the Power 5, starting in the ACC, where the top four teams play each other.
Louisville (20-2, 11-1), the No. 3 team in the VolleyballMag.com Super 16 Media Poll, plays at No. 11 Georgia Tech (19-3, 10-2), while No. 7 Pittsburgh (20-3, 11-1) is at Florida State (16-8, 10-2). The implications are huge for all four, with Louisville at No. 5 in the RPI, Pitt at 6, Georgia Tech at 17 and FSU at 30. The team a game back, Miami (15-7, 8-4, RPI 39) is home for Virginia. Wake Forest (16-7, 7-5, RPI 31) is at Duke, NC State (17-6, 7-5, RPI 39) is home for Boston College. Virginia Tech is at North Carolina and Notre Dame is at Clemson.
Two teams coming off surprising losses highlight the Pac-12 schedule when No. 4 Stanford plays host to No. 9 Washington State. Stanford holds a two-game lead over No. 6 Oregon and No. 13 Arizona State and is up three games on WSU. Oregon is home for Utah, while ASU is at UCLA. Washington goes to Cal, Colorado is at Oregon State and Arizona is at USC.
SEC-leading No. 12 Kentucky (11-7, 9-1, RPI 10) is at South Carolina, while No. 10 Tennessee (18-3, 9-2, RPI 13), a half game back of idle Arkansas (20-4, 10-2, RPI 8), plays at AVCA No. 20 Florida (14-5, 6-4, RPI 16). Alabama is at Texas A&M and Mississippi State is at Missouri.
The Big 12 slate includes league-leading No. 5 Texas back at West Virginia, No. 14 Kansas home for Kansas State, No. 15 BYU home for Cincinnati, AVCA No. 22 Houston home for UCF, and Iowa State at TCU.
Just two of the Big Ten’s ranked teams are in action and they play each other when top-ranked and unbeaten Nebraska goes to Penn State. Nebraska has won the last six meetings, but this series rarely disappoints and this one should be quite a defensive battle. Nebraska tops the B1G in opponent hitting percentage (.125) and Penn state is third (.171). They also rank 1 and 3 in kills, so something has to give. Iowa is at Michigan, Minnesota is at Ohio State, Indiana is at Rutgers and Maryland is at Michigan State.
Red-hot Dayton (25-2, 14-0) goes for its 21st in a row when the No. 16 Flyers play the first of back-to-back Atlantic 10 matches against Rhode Island.
In the Big East, Marquette, the AVCA No. 25, is up by a game over AVCA No. 17 Creighton and St. John’s. Marquette is off, while Creighton is home for DePaul and St. John’s goes to Providence.
The two teams tied for first in the Horizon League play each other when Milwaukee goes to Wright State.
Want to watch? We have the conference-by-conference schedule with viewing links for any match that is being shown in our VolleyballMag.com TV & Streaming Listings.
Texas (17-3, 12-0) did not win easily, but ultimately came away with a 25-21, 25-18, 25-19 victory at West Virginia (9-16. 2-10) in the only Big 12 match of the day. The Longhorns, who have won 12 in a row, hit .359 and got 12 kills from Madisen Skinner. Molly Philips, who had no error in 11 attacks, and Jenna Wenaas had nine kills each. Bailey Miller had 14 kills for WVU …
Pepperdine (15-6 11-0 West Coast Conference) hit .477 and crushed visiting Gonzaga (3-19, 0-11) for its 14th win in a row. The Waves had 50 kills and eight errors in 88 swings in the 25-11, 25-12, 25-12 victory. Grace Chillingsworth led with 12 kills, hitting .500 after having one error in 22 attacks. She had two aces and 16 digs … San Diego and Loyola Marymount stayed two games back as USD swept at Santa Clara and LMU did the same to visiting Portland. USD’s Amber Stivrins had 18 kills and hit .356, while LMU hit .478, including 12 kills by Kari Geissberger. She hit .471 and had an ace and three blocks. Also in the WCC, Pacific won in four at San Francisco as Alexa Edwards had 21 kills, 10 digs and four blocks …
Southeastern Louisiana (23-4, 14-1) won its 17th in a row and broke the tie at the top of the Southland by decimating visiting Texas A&M-Corpus Christi (18-9, 13-2). The Lions hit .478 in the 25-8, 25-19, 25-19 beat down with 51 kills and eight errors in 90 attacks. Rachel Hartmann had 20 kills with one error in 26 attacks to hit .731 and had an assist and five digs. Kailin Newsome had 18 kills, hit .517 and had four aces and two digs. Jacqueline Arrington had five kills in 12 errorless swings and five blocks, one solo. Gracie Duplechein had 39 assists, three blocks and 13 digs. Leah Stoltus had nine kills and three blocks for the Islanders. McNeese stayed two games behind SLU with a sweep at Lamar as McKenzie Moore had 13 kills with one error in 24 attacks, an assist, two aces, four digs and two block. New Orleans beat UIW in five and Karen Cordero Barr had 24 kills, two aces and 21 digs …
Sacramento State (18-8, 11-1) won its sixth Big Sky match in a row by beating visiting Eastern Washington in four and built its lead to two full games over idle Weber State. Bridgette Smith led the Hornets with 21 kills while hitting .314 and had two aces, a block and seven digs. Also in the Big Sky, Northern Colorado hit .435 and won in four at Montana State. Makenzie Harris had 17 kills with only two kills in 24 attacks, hitting .625 to go with an assist, three aces, 14 digs and a block …
Utah State (19-5, 12-1) won its ninth in a row and leads the Mountain West by three games after sweeping Air Force. The Aggies, who hit .381, got 14 kills from Tatum Stall and 10 from Shelby Cappllonch. Stall hit .429 and had an assist, an ace and eight digs, and Capllonch hit .364 and had three assists and nine digs. Also in the Mountain West, New Mexico won in four at Boise State, which got 26 kills, 13 digs and a block from Paige Bartsch. Bartsch leads the MWC in kills with 238, 25 ahead of UNLV’s Isabel Martin. Bartsch leads the conference in aces with 23 and Capplonch is second with 22 …
Stephen F. Austin (24-3, 13-0) builts its WAC lead to two games with a sweep of Seattle U as Grand Canyon(18-6, 11-2) fell off the pace by losing in four at Tarleton State. SFA won its 13th in a row as it hit .337 and got 13 kills from Ielan Bradley, who had four blocks, two solo …
The Summit League has five teams within a game in the loss column of each other. Denver and Omaha are tied at 10-4, North Dakota State is 9-4 and Kansas City and South Dakota are 8-4. Denver hit .464 and swept at Oral Roberts. Ava Reynolds led with 11 kills and hit .562. Omaha beat Kansas City in four as Rachel Fairbanks had 20 kills, hit .586 and had 23 digs and two blocks. North Dakota State beat visiting South Dakota State in five as four players had 12 or more kills, 18 by Ali Hinze, who had four assists, an ace, 17 digs and three blocks. And South Dakota swept at St. Thomas as Madison Harms had 12 kills with one error in 17 swings, two digs and four blocks, two solo …
The Citadel is now 23-2 after losing two in a row, but at 11-2 still holds a two-game lead over Mercer in the SoCon. The Bulldogs lost at their second straight match, this time in five at Wofford (17-7, 8-5) before 426 fans, second largest in program history. 25-21, 22-25, 25-19, 21-25, 15-12. Wofford had four players with 11 or more kills, 14 by Bri Mahoney, who had an assist and six digs. Mary Emily Morgan had 13 kills, an asist, an ace, two solo blocks and 22 digs and Laney Klika had 33 digs and four assists. Ali Ruffin had 16 kills for The Citadel to go with three assists, two aces, a solo block and 15 digs. Jaelynn Elgert had 35 digs and three assists …
Southern Miss beat visiting Louisiana-Lafayette in four in the Sun Belt as Mia Wesley had 21 kills, two assists, two aces, 12 digs and a block … South Florida won its American Athletic Conference match in five at Temple as Maria Clara Andrade had 24 kills, hit .400 and had two assists, an ace, 11 digs and two blocks, one solo … Liberty swept its Conference USA match against visiting Louisiana Tech as Kate Phillips had 16 kills with one error in 33 swings, two assists, a block and 15 digs … Grambling won its SWAC match in four over Arkansas-Pine Bluff and Kai Williams had 23 kills, hit .367 and had three aces, 18 digs and a block.
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