Volleyball Today: Louisville sweeps Stanford; Pitt, Nebraska roll; big wins for UK, OU
Lopsided victories.
Top-ranked Pittsburgh demolished No. 12 Georgia Tech, winning 25-11, 25-17, 25-8 on the road Sunday.
No. 2 Nebraska overpowered No. 20 USC.
And fourth-ranked Louisville not only beat visiting No. 3 Stanford, the Cardinals swept the Cardinal.
No. 13 Kentucky didn’t sweep its SEC match at No. 15 Florida, but the Wildcats won in four on a walk-off ace by Brooklyn DeLeye, who had 24 kills.
The upset of the day was by Oklahoma, which knocked off visiting No. 20 Tennessee for its first victory over a ranked team since 2014.
Reverse sweeps? Of course, Michigan did it to visiting Rutgers and Texas A&M did it to visiting Missouri.
Lines of the day: Penn State’s Jess Mruzik had 29 kills in a four-set win over Michigan State, hitting .356 with two assists and 10 digs. Binghamton’s Tsvetelina Ilieva had 28 kills in a four-set win over LIU, Camyrn Luginbuhl had 24 kills in a Sacred Heart sweep of Iona, and Jacksonville’s Breana McDonough had 22 kills in a sweep of North Florida.
The second VolleyballMag Super 16 Media Poll comes out later Monday morning and the AVCA releases its top 25 in the afternoon. Things will look different than last week.
Also later Monday, volleyball analyst extraordinaire Emily Ehman and VolleyballMag editor Lee Feinswog will get together for their weekly NCAA Zoom.
There are four SWAC matches Monday, one in the MEAC and one in the WAC. The 12 teams involved have a combined 41 victories.
Sunday’s NCAA volleyball recaps, top performances
ACC
The big match of the day was Stanford at Louisville in their first ACC encounter and the Cardinals dominated 25-16, 25-23, 25-22. Louisville (10-2, 2-0) got 28 kills from its outside hitters as Stanford had a total of 32 kills. Charitie Luper led with 18 kills, hitting .316, and had two blocks and 13 digs. Anna DeBeer had 10 kills, hit .304, and had an assist and 12 digs. The Cardinals hit .248 and had two aces — both by Elle Glock — and 10 serving errors. Stanford (9-2, 2-1) hit .144 and had two aces and 13 errors. Elie Rubin, who hit .073, led the Cardinal with nine kills, two assists, two blocks and seven digs …
Pitt (12-0, 2-0) never gave Georgia Tech (8-3, 0-2) a chance as the Panthers hit .438. Olivia Babcock had 12 kills with one error in 23 attacks, 10 digs and five blocks, and Torrey Stafford had 11 kills with one error in 20 swings, two assists, an ace, six digs and two blocks. Georgia Tech had 24 kills and 24 errors to hit minus .043 …
No. 18 Florida State (10-2, 2-0) beat No. 25 Miami (9-4, 0-2) again, this time sweeping in a hurricane-delayed match. Audrey Koenig led with 13 kills, hitting .324, and she had two aces, five digs and two blocks … No. 23 SMU (10-3, 2-0) swept at Clemson (8-5, 2-0) as Maya Tabron had 11 kills, hitting .393, to go with three aces, 14 digs and two blocks, one solo … North Carolina (10-1, 2-0) beat visiting Boston College (7-7, 0-2) in four as Mabrey Shaffmaster had 19 kills, hit .308, and had an assist, an ace, 13 digs and two blocks … NC State (7-3, 2-0) dealt visiting Virginia (11-2, 1-1) a four-set defeat despite hitting .029 … Wake Forest (9-4, 1-1) beat visiting Virginia Tech (6-6, 0-2), which hit .061, in four … Duke (6-7, 2-0) kept pace with the leaders as the Blue Devils beat Syracuse (12-2, 0-2) in four as the Orange lost its second straight match after starting 12-0. Duke’s Kerry Keefe had 21 kills with three errors in 42 attacks to hit .429 and had an assist, an ace, 10 digs and a block.
Big Ten
Nebraska (12-1, 2-0) swept visiting USC (9-3, 1-1) 25-18, 25-22, 25-16 as the Huskers won their 33rd match in a row at home and ninth in a row overall this season. Harper Murray led with 12 kills — nine in the second set — two assists, two aces and six digs, and Merritt Beason had 11 kills, two assists, an ace, nine digs and two blocks. USC’s Ally Batenhorst, a graduate-student transfer, led the Trojans with 13 kills in her return to her old school. She had nine digs and a block ..
Penn State (12-1, 2-0), which lost only to Pitt, came away with a 23-25, 25-17, 25-21, 25-23 victory over visiting Michigan State (7-6, 0-2) as Jess Mruzik had 29 kills, hitting .356, to go with 10 digs … UCLA (7-4, 1-1) beat visiting Ohio State (7-5, 0-2) in four behind 17 kills by Cheridyn Leverette, who had three digs and two blocks. … Michigan (12-1, 2-0) got all it could handle from Rutgers (5-6, 0-2) before coming away with a 22-25, 22-25, 25-22, 25-17, 17-15 reverse sweep victory. Allison Jacobs led the Wolverines with 25 kills, three assists, three blocks and nine digs. Morgan Burke had 54 assists, an ace, a block and nine digs. Alissa Kinkela led Michigan State with 24 kills, hitting .432, to go with an assist, two blocks and a match-high 14 digs.
SEC
Kentucky (7-6, 1-1) won 25-19, 25-20, 20-25, 30-28 at Florida (10-3, 1-1) as Brookyn DeLeye had 24 kills, hit .370, and had three assists, five aces — including the match-ender — eight digs and three blocks, one solo. Brooke Bultema had 13 kills, hit .524, and had two blocks, one solo. Kennedy Martin was magnificent for Florida, with 25 kills — many from the back row — hitting .413 to go with five aces, seven digs and two blocks …
Oklahoma (7-3, 1-1), which took Florida to five before losing its SEC opener, came back and held on for a 27-25, 25-22, 19-25, 25-23 victory over Tennessee (8-4, 1-1). It was the first time OU beat a ranked opponent since 2014. Alexis Shelton led with 19 kills, two blocks and four digs. Lydia Martin and Kari Geissberger had 14 kills apiece. Nina Cajic had 22 kills and hit .429 for Tennessee … No. 8 Texas (7-3, 2-0) swept at LSU (8-5, 0-2) … Arkansas (12-2, 2-0) swept visiting Ole Miss (10-3, 0-1) … Auburn (12-1, 2-0) battled to a four-set victory over visiting Alabama (8-5, 0-2) … And Texas A&M (10-2, 1-1) won 17-25, 20-25, 25-23, 25-21, 15-12 over visiting Missouri (9-4, 1-1) for its first reverse sweep since 2015. Emily Hellmuth led the Aggies with 19 kills, hitting .333, and she had 10 digs and three blocks. Logan Lednicky had 15 kills, hit .324 and had two assists, eight digs and two blocks. Missouri’s Mychael Vernon had 26 kills, hit .311, and added two assists, 11 digs and four blocks. Jordan Iliff had a Missouri rally-scoring ear record nine aces to go with 15 kills. She had seven of those aces in a row in the first set.
Around the nation
No. 6 Creighton (11-2, 2-0) hit .471 and swept its Big East match against visiting UConn (12-2, 0-2) which has now lost two in a row. Ava Martin had 12 kills with one error in 25 attacks and Norah Sis had 11 kills in 15 errorless swings. Each had two aces. Also in the Big East, Marquette swept Providence and St. John’s did the same to Georgetown to keep pace with Creighton …
In the only Big 12 match of the day, Utah (12-1, 2-0) held on for a five-set win over visiting Colorado (7-7, 0-2). Four Utes had 10 or more kills, 16 by Kamryn Gaiadio …
In the biggest CAA rivalry, Towson (12-2, 3-1) won in five at Delaware (7-4, 3-1) as Victoria Barrett had 23 kills in the 25-20, 18-25, 25-18, 27-29, 15-8 slugfest … Canisius not only kept 0-12 Marist winless, but is off to a 2-0 start in the MAAC for the first time since 2021. Kara Zaucha had 16 kills, hit .382, and had an assist, three aces, 10 digs and four blocks. Also in the MAAC, Saint Peters got 24 kills from Maliyah LaBrie in a five-set win over Quinnipiac, its first win over Quinnipiac in nine years and first conference win in two years. Sacred Heart got a whopping 24 kills from Camryn Luginbuhl in a sweep of Iona. Luginbuhnl, in setting the program record for kills in a three-set match, had two errors in 40 attacks to hit .550 and had 14 digs. She had 24 kills the day before in a five-set win at Manhattan and earlier this season had 30 kills in a five-set win over Kent State …
All six American Athletic Conference matches and all three in the ASUN were sweeps. In Jacksonville’s win at North Florida, Breana McDoough had 22 kills with three errors in 39 swings to hit .487 and she had seven digs, and in the victory by Queens at Stetson, Alleigh Johnson had 20 kills and hit .594 after having one error in 32 attacks … In Binghamton’s four-set win over LIU, Tsvetelina Ilieva had 28 kills, hitting .384, with an assist, two aces and 13 digs … TaKenya Stafford had 22 kills for Coppin State in its five-set MEAC win over UMES, which got 21 kills from Mkemjika Ikemefuna … Bucknell is 12-1, 4-0 in the Patriot League, after a four-set win over Lehigh … In Samford’s five-set SoCon victory at Chattanooga, Kaleigh Meritt had 24 kills with five errors in 68 swings.
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