Wisconsin Season Closes with NCAA Loss
December 06, 2003 | Volleyball
For the second year in a row, the Wisconsin volleyball team ended its season in the second round of the NCAA tournament. The Badgers lost to 16th-seeded Texas A&M, 30-22, 30-24, 30-18 to end their season at 22-11.
'Of course I'm disappointed that the season 's ending today, but we played a very good team and credit goes to Texas A & M for having an excellent match tonight,' Head Coach Pete Waite said. 'We just had a lot of trouble on our outside, I think the blockers for A&M were touching a lot of balls and picking them back even though the scoring, the stats, on the digs were equal, I just thought they were making some critical digs and at times we weren't able to score.'
Wisconsin struggled offensively in the match, hitting .178 percent. The Badgers tied a season-low with just 39 kills compared to 53 for the Aggies. Jill Odenthal had a match-high 12 kills and Sheila Shaw added 10 kills as the only two UW players in double-figures.
'I don't think that it's as much of a let down emotionally as it is physically, a lot of us are very tired afterward on both sides, ' Odenthal said of the matches' long rallies. 'It's those couple of extra little things and not necessarily in the long rally, even at the end of game that really determine the outcome of the whole thing. I just really felt that we were chasing them a lot of the time.'
A&M had four players in double figure kills led by Beth Skypala and Melissa Munsch with 11 kills apiece. Laura Jones and Kendra Felder put down 10 kills each as the Aggies hit .319 percent as a team.
'That's always tough, the balanced attack is hard to stop,' Coach Waite said of the A&M offense. 'Normally we 're that type of team, but we had a little trouble getting a couple of our hitters on track tonight. Normally Meierotto does a great job for us and Zukowski scores well, but we were only getting it out of Odenthal and Sheila Shaw tonight.'
Texas A&M outblocked the Badgers 8 to 4.5 and also outserved Wisconsin 7-4 in aces. The Badgers were led by Aubrey Meierotto and Amy Bladow with two blocks apiece while Odenthal led the team with three aces, all in Game 2.
'They were a big team from pin to pin,' Coach Waite added. 'They just touched a lot of balls and slowed them down for their defense, and when we did get it by the block, they were moving well to the ball and able to run their offense really well.'
Both teams had 62 digs as Jill Maier led all back-row players with 20 digs for the second match in a row. Morgan Shields and Lisa Zukowski each added 10 digs to the Badger defense. Shields put up 35 assists running the UW offense.
Game 1 featured a number of long rallies making it a defensive battle with both teams recording 30 digs. With the score tied at 15, the Aggies Beth Skypala keyed a 4-1 run with two kills to put A&M up 19-16. Skypala and Kendra Felder, who combined for 11 of the Aggies 20 kills in the first period, put A&M up 25-19. Wisconsin would cut it to three (25-22) but would be shut out the rest of the period.
The Badgers couldn't stop the Aggies offensive attack in Game 2 as A&M hit .341 percent in the period. Wisconsin rallied from 15-11 deficit to tie the score at 15 off three straight service aces from Odenthal. The game was tied five more times including at 20 all before A&M scored four straight to take a 24-20 lead. The Badgers held off one Aggie game point but a UW hitting error put the home team up two games to none.
'We were always playing catch-up ball,' Coach Waite said. 'Sometimes we were struggling with our serve-receive and that makes it tough to run our offense as well. They were a good team, and were playing well in front of an excited home crowd. They just kept the momentum on their side for most of the time. I thought that we battled well in the first two games. I think we played some really great ball, transitioned well off some tough hits and played the kind of game we're used to playing. But we just broke down at times, our ball handling needed to be better if we were going to beat that team.'
Wisconsin seemed to run out of steam in the third game as A&M jumped out to a 3-0 lead and the Badgers could never get back into the game. The UW pulled to within two (9-7) but the Aggies scored three straight to take a 13-7 lead. Despite making several substitutions, the Badgers couldn't get back on track and fell in three straight.
Wisconsin says good bye to seniors Maier, Shields, Zukowski and Angie Sanger who complete their eligibility.
