Nebraska 1 vs Wisconsin 3 - 25-14, 23-25, 24-26, 18-25
Nebraska started this match very focused, and beat Wisconsin soundly in the first set. The Huskers held the Badgers to 14 points, the fewest points scored in a set by Wisconsin this season. Nebraska accomplished this by serving very tough and pin pointing areas on the court that caused trouble for passers and reduced the offensive threats.
Nebraska also made few errors (0 at the service line and 5 on attack) in set 1 which set them up for longer point runs and didn’t allow Wisconsin to go on runs. Anna Smrek and benched Jade Demps. Demps had a great match against Minnesota last weekend with 18 kills and hitting .265.
They started Smrek because she destroyed the NU defense in the last match between these teams. Tonight, however, Nebraska held her to just 3 kills. Nebraska also had great passing early on in the match and that allowed Nicklin Hames to dish the ball to all her hitters. She moved the offense around with great command, spreading sets and changing hit locations.
Both teams played a clean game with few errors. The first net violation only happened at the end of set 2 and there wasn’t another net violation in the match. That is clean volleyball.
There were a couple errors at the end of a close set 2 that gave Wisconsin the edge. Most notably was the net serve by Knuckles to grant Wisconsin it’s 23rd point in the set. We also look at the drop off in kills by Whitney Lauenstein during set 2. She produced 6 kills in the match and 5 of them came early in the match.
Coach Cook talked about the right side position after the match and said ‘we just need more fire power over there”. Coach was overall please with how the team competed tonight and went after Wisconsin.
Saturday Nebraska travels to #6 Purdue (23-5, 15-4). Saturday at 8 p.m. CT match against the Boilermakers will be televised on BTN and streamed on the FOX Sports app.
Then Nebraska awaits its fate for the NCAA Tournament, which begins with the first and second rounds, Dec. 3-4, on campus sites. The complete 2021 tournament field will be unveiled during the NCAA Selection Show this Sunday, Nov. 28 at 7:30 p.m. CT on ESPNU.