Badgers Fall to Gophers in Four
November 15, 2006 | Volleyball
With second place in the Big Ten Conference on the line, the No. 10 Wisconsin volleyball team (20-7 overall, 14-3 Big Ten) played No. 12 Minnesota all the way to four games but came up short Wednesday night at the UW Field House. The Badgers fell to third place in the conference with the 30-26, 30-22, 18-30, 30-25 loss.
'Timing is everything and they caught us at a time when we're not playing our best ball,' UW head coach Pete Waite said. 'It took us until the third game until we started getting some continuity as an offense and playing with the aggressiveness we played with in the last month. It took us a while to come out of the funk that we've been in the last five days since the Northwestern match. We've got to find as a team where we were'the attitude, the confidence and the aggressiveness we had.'
The Golden Gophers (21-6, 13-4) now own sole possession of second place in the conference and are right behind No. 5 Penn State (25-2, 14-2).
Tonight's game marked the first Big Ten loss at the Field House for the Badgers this season and just the second loss at home for the entire year. UW dropped its first match of the season against then-No. 8 Texas and then went on a 12-match home win streak until tonight.
The Badgers struggled with their hitting tonight but found saving graces in two underclassmen. Freshman Brittney Dolgner led all players with 25 kills. After tallying a career-high hitting percentage against Illinois last weekend, sophomore Audra Jeffers continued her good hitting with 13 kills and a .407 hitting percentage in the match.
Wisconsin could not keep up with Minnesota's balanced offense though as four Gophers tallied double-digit kills and the team hit .252 compared to UW's .173 on the night. Minnesota's Meredith Nelson knocked down 17 kills while Jessy Jones added 15.
The Badgers were uncharacteristically off on the block tonight and finished with a season low 4.5 compared to Minnesota's 14. Both Dolgner and junior Taylor Reineke added solo blocks while Reineke contributed another two block assists. For Minnesota, Nelson ended the night with two solos and five block assists.
'It's a team game,' Waite said regarding his team's block total. 'We had three players hit negative for us tonight and that's not very normal, and again it comes down to passing. If Jackie's having to bump set a lot of the balls, then we lose our middles and the offense, and then they can key on our outside hitters. It makes the block easier for them and that's what happened. '
In digs, Wisconsin trailed Minnesota slightly. Junior Jocelyn Wack contributed 20 of the team's 50 digs while junior Jackie Simpson and Dolgner each added seven digs. Minnesota finished with 53 saves with Malama Peniata tallying 17 digs.
Simpson also contributed 40 of Wisconsin's 51 assists. The Gophers had 54 assists on the night with Rachel Hartmann tallying 46 assists.
One area the Badgers outdid the Gophers in was service aces. UW tallied six aces compared to Minnesota's two but both teams also struggled from the service line with each finishing with eight service errors.
UW came out with the jitters in game one as they had three service errors early on. Minnesota got an early lead on Wisconsin and went up four at 17-13. Wack then served up a five-point run to tie the score at 18. The Gophers then responded with a six-point run of their own to take back the lead at 22-18. The Badgers would score the next point but then Minnesota used another four-point streak to go up seven at 26-19. Wisconsin held Minnesota to game point two times at 29-26 and 29-25 but couldn't hold on long enough as the Gophers took game one, 30-26.
The Badgers stayed on Minnesota's heels in game two until a six-point run behind the service of Nelson put the Gophers up eight at 23-15. UW would cut the lead to six at 27-21 but couldn't stop Minnesota's .467 hitting in the 30-22 decision.
'I told them about serving and passing and that was a lot of it,' Waite said on what he told his team after game two. 'Just relax and get your passes, so Jackie can set the ball and run the offense. They did just that. They came out with more fire and more focus and they had a good game in the third.'
Wisconsin turned it around in game three and this time it was the Gophers playing from behind. During a stretch late in the game, the UW scored eight of nine points to go up by its biggest lead of the match at 27-15. Dolgner tallied five kills during the stretch and ended game one with seven kills. This time it was the Badgers holding the Gophers to a .049 hitting percentage as they took game three, 30-18.
Minnesota got out to a quick lead in game four and went up by five at 7-2. UW used a small four-point run to then take the lead at 10-9. From then on, both teams remained within a few points of one another and tied each other three times late. A service ace by junior Megan Mills knotted the score at 23 but then Nelson tallied three straight kills to put Minnesota up 26-23. The Badgers would score just two more points in the game as the Gophers took game four, 30-25.
Wisconsin returns to the Field House Friday for senior day in its final home match of the regular season against Iowa. Match time is set for 7 p.m.
