Volleyball Today: B1G win for Purdue; big NCAA Sunday ahead

Purdue aced a big test at Minnesota and Iowa is tied for the Big Ten lead.

South Dakota State is 13-0 after its four-set Summit League win at Denver and Washington won again to get to 12-0.

The line of the day was pretty stout:  In Coastal Carolina’s sweep of Marshall Jalyn Stout had 18 kills, hit .519, and had 13 assists, two aces, 16 digs and three blocks.

Sunday will be a volleyball-watcher’s dream with a loaded schedule. That and the key results and top performances follow in this all-NCAA edition of Volleyball Today. 

NCAA volleyball Sunday

When the ACC brought in Stanford and Cal, we knew, at the least, Stanford would play Pittsburgh and Louisville. The first of those matches is Sunday when No. 3 Stanford is at No 4 Louisville. There are eight other ACC matches, including No. 1 Pitt at No. 12 Georgia Tech, the rescheduled No. 18 Florida State at No. 25 Miami. No. 22 SMU at Clemson and Cal at Notre Dame. Also, Syracuse tries to bounce back from its first loss when it goes to Duke, Boston College is at 9-1 North Carolina, 11-1 Virginia is at NC State and Virginia Tech is at Wake Forest. 

The four Big Ten matches show No. 2 Nebraska home for No. 20 USC, No. 5 Penn State home for Michigan State, Ohio State at UCLA and Rutgers at Michigan, which, like Penn State and Nebraska, is 11-1.

The SEC has a showcase match, too, when perennial league powers resume their rivalry with No. 13 Kentucky at No. 15 Florida. Eight-ranked Texas makes its first SEC trip to LSU, No. 20 Tennessee is at Oklahoma, Texas A&M is home for Missouri, Ole Miss (10-2) is at Arkansas (11-2) and Alabama is at Auburn, which is coming off its reverse-sweep upset at Kentucky. 

The only Big 12 match has Colorado at Utah.

Sixth-ranked Creighton is home for a Big East match with UConn, which is coming off its first defeat. Marquette, which swept UConn, is home for Providence.

Bucknell, off to an 11-1 start, 3-0 in the Patriot League, plays host to Lehigh.

Winless watch: Just one Sunday when Marist (0-11) goes to Canisius, which is coached by one-time Marist coach Tom Hanna, whose daughter Jillian, averaging 4.43 digs per set, is one of his seniors who used to play at Marist.

TV time: In addition to ESPN+, the Worldwide Leader has plenty of volleyball Sunday on its regular outlets.

Kentucky at Florida is on ESPN at 1 p.m. Eastern, followed by Stanford vs. Louisville. Texas at LSU is one of three back-to-back on the SEC Network, at Pitt-GT is on the ACC Network. 

Purdue gets big B1G victory

To say that No. 10 Purdue (10-3, 1-1) served host No. 16 Minnesota (8-4, 1-1) off the floor is not hyperbole, because the Boilermakers had 17 aces — five in the fifth set — of their 26-24, 23-25, 25-20, 23-25, 15-10 victory. And they needed it, too, since Purdue had lost three of four after starting the season 9-0.

After Purdue sided out to take a 10-7 lead in the fifth, Julia Kane had three aces in a row, one coming out of a time out.

The star was middle Raven Colvin, who not only had 19 kills, hitting .387, with five digs and five blocks, one solo, but a career-high seven aces. Eva Hudson added 18 kills, an assist, two blocks and 11 digs, and Chloe Chicoine had 14 kills, an assist and 11 digs. Ali Hornung had 24 digs and three assists and Taylor Anderson had three kills, 54 assists, an ace, four blocks and 12 digs. Her team hit .252. 

Julia Hanson had 19 kills and hit .447 for Minnesota to go with four blocks and nine digs. Lydia Grote had 17 kills, hit .319, and had an assist, an ace, three blocks and nine digs. Phoebe Awoleye had six kills, hit .357, and had seven blocks, one solo. Melani Shaffmaster, like Anderson, had three kills but three errors, 45 assists, two aces, a block and eight digs. Her team hit .240 … 

No. 7 Wisconsin swept at Northwestern as the Badgers hit .413 in the 25-16, 25-16, 25-15 victory. Sarah Franklin led with 11 kills and hit .500 after having one error in 20 attacks, two assists, two of Wisconsin’s nine aces, and a solo block. Northwestern hit .067 … 

No. 11 Oregon (10-1, 0-2) beat visiting Indiana (7-5, 0-2) in four as Mimi Colyer had 17 kills and hit .318 in the 26-24, 27-25, 21-25, 25-21 victory. Colyer had two aces, 13 digs and two blocks, one solo. IU’s Avry Tatum had 24 kills, hit .395, and had two assists, an ace, a block and five digs … Washington (12-0) is sure to move into the AVCA top 25 Monday after the Huskies improved to 12-0 with their 25-15, 30-38, 25-17 victory over visiting Illinois (8-4, 0-2), which hit .029. Audra Wilmes led with 11 kills, eight digs and three blocks, one solo … and here’s a phrase not normally heard in the Big Ten: Iowa (8-6, 2-0) stayed tied for the league lead with a 27-25, 21-25, 25-23, 23-25, 15-13 victory at Maryland (9-4, 0-2). Gabby Deery led with 20 kills as she hit .410 and had an assist, five digs and a block. Maryland’s Sydney Bryant had 24 kills, hit .320 and had three digs and two blocks.

Around the nation

No. 17 BYU swept its Big 12 match against visiting Texas Tech as Kjersti Strong had 12 kills with one error in 18 attacks to hit .611 and added an assist, three digs and three blocks, one solo. In the other Big 12 match, Iowa State hit .340 and beat visiting West Virginia in five. Aimee Hendricks-Walker had 18 kills with two errors in 27 swings to hit .593 and had two blocks … 

No. 24 Dayton improved to 12-1, 2-0 in the Atlantic 10, with another sweep of visiting Rhode Island, which hit minus .027. The Flyers hit .376 and Lexi Almodovar had 17 kills, hit .483, and had two aces, three digs and four blocks, one solo. Also in the A10, Saint Louis swept Fordham and Addy Brus had 16 kills with one error in 34 attacks, two assists, two aces, seven digs and a solo block. Julia Rienks had 15 kills, three aces, 16 digs and two blocks, one solo, in VCU’s four-set win at George Mason … 

Meg Mersman had 17 kills and hit .500 in Lipscomb’s five-set ASUN win at Bellarmine. She had nine blocks, four solo, and an ace. Also in the ASUN, in Central Arkansas’ four-set win at North Florida, both Laci Bohannan and Mackenzie Vernon had 20 kills and hit over .400 … Bryant won its America East opener in four against Dartmouth and Aubrey Lapour had 23 kills and hit .426 as the Bulldogs improved to 14-4. She had four digs and four blocks … Idaho State improved to 11-3, 2-0 in the Big Sky, with a five-set win over visiting Northern Colorado as four Bengals had 13 kills apiece. Also in the Big Sky, Portland State beat Montana in four as five players had 10 or more kills … 

Olivia Utterback had 18 kills and hit .444 for UC Davis in a sweep of UC San Diego to go with an ace and 12 digs. Also in the Big West, UC Santa Barbara beat CSUN in four and Eva Travis had 21 kills, hit .410, and had an assist, an ace and 12 digs, and in a Hawai’i sweep of Cal State Fullerton, hometown freshman middle Miliana Sylvester had 14 kills with one error in 17 attacks to hit .765 and added a dig and three blocks, one solo … 

Four players had 10 or more kills as Delaware beat visiting Towson 25-22, 25-12, 18-25, 25-21 in a rematch of last year’s CAA Tournament championship match. The Blue Hens improved to 7-3, 3-0 in the CAA. Also in the CAA, Northeastern won in four at N.C. A&T despite  22 kills by Hannah Howell, who had 12 digs and two blocks, one solo. And Hampton dropped to 0-15 when the Pirates were swept at Hofstra … Western Kentucky hit .423 in its Conference USA sweep at Jacksonville State. Alivia Skidmore had 13 kills with one error in 26 attacks, Kenadee Coyle had 12 with two errors in 19 swings, and Kaylee Cox had nine kills with one error in 18 attacks … Wright State pulled off a Horizon League reverse sweep at IU Indianapolis … Cornell also had a reverse-sweep win over visiting Columbia in the Ivy League opener for both teams. Eliza Konvicka had 22 kills, hit .333, and had three aces, 11 digs and four blocks, one solo. Also in the Ivy, in Princeton’s four-set win at Penn, Kamryn Chaney had 24 kills, two aces and four digs … 

Canisius won its MAAC match in five over visiting Siena despite 27 kills by Sara Wagner, who hit .339 and had two assists, one ace, 10 digs and three blocks. Kara Zaucha had 19 kills for Canisius to go with an assist, four aces, 15 digs and four blocks. Also in the MAAC, Sacred Heart won in five at Manhattan as Camryn Luginbuhl had 24 kills, an assist, an ace, 15 digs and three blocks, in Merrimack’s four-set win over Saint Peters Julz Carlat had 19 kills, hit .467 and had an assist, an ace, three digs and two blocks, and Niagara swept Marist to drop the Red Foxes to 0-11 … Ohio won in five at Akron and Anna Kharchynska had 26 kills in the MAC victory to go with seven digs and seven blocks. Also in the MAC, Buffalo’s Manoela Forlin had 20 kills in a sweep at Western Michigan, which hadn’t dropped a conference match since 2022 … 

Bradley beat Murray State and Iva Popovic had 23 kills in the Missouri Valley victory. Also in the MVC, Guila Cardona stayed hot with 21 kills and nine digs but Evansville lost in four to UIC, which hit .336 as Zahria Woodard had 13 kills with no errors in 21 attacks and five blocks, Kira Fallert had 18 kills for UNI and hit .341 with an assist, an ace, six digs and two blocks in a sweep of Missouri State … Colorado State beat Nevada in four in the Mountain West as Malaya Jones had 22 kills, hitting .474, to go with an ace, six digs and a solo block. Also in the MWC. Paige Lauterwasser had 23 kills for Wyoming in a five-set win at Utah State, and in New Mexico’s five-set win over visiting San Diego State, Lauryn Payne had 23 kills, six digs and three blocks. Falanika Danielson had 22 digs, eight assists and an ace …  Western Illinois hit .423 is an OVC sweep of SIUE as Keyana Cruse had 17 kills with two errors in 33 attacks, two aces and 10 digs. Also in the OVC, Tennessee Tech improved to 13-1 with a four-set win over Morehead State behind 25 kills by Madolyn Isringhausen, who hit .453 and had an assist, an ace, seven digs and two blocks, one solo, and in Little Rock’s four-set win over UT Martin, Andrea Roman had 23 digs, 15 assists and an ace and Dariana Valencia had 26 assists and 22 digs … 

Loyola Maryland won its Patriot League match in five at Army West Point as Lauren Link had 21 kills, three aces and seven digs and Army’s Kingsley Wallace had 22 kills, hit .373, and had two blocks. Also in the PL, in American’s sweep at Holy Cross Zedo Yilmaz had 20 kills with two errors in 30 attacks to hit .600 and added an assist, eight digs and two blocks, Bucknell is 11-1 after sweeping Lafayette, and Navy dropped to 0-13 when it was swept at Colgate … In the Southland, Southeastern Louisiana beat UIW in five as Cicily Hidalgo had 23 kills, hit .346 and had 16 digs and four blocks and former Volleyball Baton Rouge libero Lexi Gonzalez had 24 digs, two assists and two aces. Also in the SLC, McNeese lost in four at Texas A&M-Commerce but Mckenzie Moore had 25 kills to go with three assists, two aces, 10 digs and two blocks, one solo …  

South Dakota State is 13-0, 2-0 in The Summit League, after winning in four at Denver. Sylvie Zgonc had 17 kills, five digs and three blocks, two solo … In Texas State’s Sun Belt sweep at Louisiana, Samantha Wunsch had 18 kills, two digs and four blocks and setter Ryann Torres had two kills in five errorless tries, 39 assists, eight digs and a block. Also in the SBC, in Coastal Carolina’s sweep of Marshall sophomore Jalyn Stout had 18 kills, hit .519, and had 13 assists, two aces, 16 digs and three blocks. It was her sixth triple-double of the season and 20th of her career … UT Arlington came away with a five-set WAC victory at California Baptist as Brianna Ford had 25 kills, hit .408, and added an assist, two aces, six digs and six blocks, one solo … Annika Hester had 19 kills, hit .405, and had two digs and four blocks for Oregon State in its four-set WCC win at Portland. 

The post Volleyball Today: B1G win for Purdue; big NCAA Sunday ahead appeared first on Volleyballmag.com.