Volleyball Today: Texas, Stanford win; Olympians shine in Chicago; USA crushes France

In this Volleyball Today:

— Wisconsin is in a place that the program hasn’t seen in 31 years as Texas and Stanford got victories in the State Farm Volleyball Showcase here in Milwaukee; 

— There was another busy slate Sunday in NCAA volleyball;  

— Olympians won the respective women’s and men’s titles at the AVP Chicago Open;

— And the USA sitting team figuratively served France off the court in the Paris Paralympics.

There’s more NCAA volleyball Monday with six matches after an incredibly busy opening weekend.

At Fiserve Forum an hour from the Wisconsin campus, Stanford plays the Badgers at 4 p.m. Central on Fox and Texas plays Minnesota at 6:30 on FS1.

There are four other NCAA women’s matches Monday, McNeese vs. Southern in a battle of Louisiana schools, Coastal Carolina vs. Georgia Tech, Texas A&M vs. Texas A&M-Corpus Christi and UC Davis continues its trip to Indiana by playing at Indiana.

Texas overpowers Wisconsin

When last we saw Texas, it won the national championship, but gone from that team are superstar middle Asjia O’Neal and steady standout right side Molly Phillips.

Don’t, however, cry for the Longhorns.

Consider that in their 30-28, 23-25, 25-15, 25-11 beatdown of Wisconsin on Sunday sophomore middle Marianna Singletary had nine kills, hit .438, and had eight blocks, two solo. And that Kentucky-transfer right side Reagan Rutherford had 14 kills, hit .367 and had six digs and two blocks.

Throw in the best player in the nation in outside Madi Skinner (15 kills, six digs and a block) and a new setter in Baylor transfer Averi Carlson to complement Ella Swindle and, well, Texas is OK. Oh, yeah, outside Jenna Wenaas led with 18 kills, 10 digs and two blocks, one solo.

“We have a lot more options. Both setters are really good, Both bring good things to our team,” said UT coach Jerritt Elliott. Molly was such a good player for us and was so well respected and made play after play, but we had to be more in system with her. I think we can change it a bit and set longer balls to Reagan and have a little more firepower over there.

“Our middles are young, but they’re going to get better at it.”

Junior libero Emma Halter, who was so good down the stretch for Texas last year had 28 digs and five assists.

Wisconsin, which opened its season with a four-set loss to Louisville this past Tuesday, is 0-2 for the first time since 1993.

Sarah Franklin, last year’s Big Ten player of the year, had 25 kills, two assists, an ace, nine digs and two blocks. She took 69 of her team’s 163 swings. Devyn Robinson, who had four blocks, one solo, and Anna Smrek had seven kills each.

Texas hit .265 with a total of five hitting errors in the third and fourth sets and had seven aces with eight service errors. Wisconsin hit .153 — the Badgers hit .179 against Louisville — and had two aces and 10 errors.

“It was a very impressive defensive performance by them,” Wisconsin coach Kelly Sheffield said.

Stanford outlasts Minnesota

Fifth-ranked Stanford, which opened its season with a sweep at nearby Milwaukee on Friday, got setter Kami Miner back and grinded to a 26-28, 25-23, 16-25, 25-13, 15-13 win over No. 18 Minnesota.

Elia Rubin led with 19 kills, an assist, two aces, three blocks and 13 digs. Sami Francis had 14 kills, hit .393, and had three blocks. Two newcomers to the lineup were key as sophomore outside Jordyn Harvey had a career-high 12 kills, an assist, and a career-high seven aces, a block and five digs, and freshman middle Lizzy Andrew had eight kills, hit .429, and had an assist, a block and a dig.

Miner had three kills, 47 assists and 17 digs. Her team hit .222 and had 12 aces and 12 serving errors. Libero Elena Oglivie had 16 digs and six assists. Stanford is still without highly touted freshman outside Julia Blyashov, out with an undisclosed injury.

Minnesota, which lost its season opener despite hitting .302, had nine aces and 23 errors. Junior McKenna Wucherer led with 14 kills, two assists, two aces, 10 digs and six blocks, on solo. Julia Hanson had 14 kills, an assist, an ace, two blocks and six digs. Lydia Grote added 11 kills, hit .321, and had an ace, two blocks and four digs. Calissa Minatee had four kills and a career-high seven blocks, two solo.

Melani Shaffmaster, the setter slowed in recent years with a bad knee and cumbersome brace, is brace free and moving better than ever. The fifth-year had four kills in five errorless attempts, 40 assists, three aces, two blocks and eight digs.

NCAA volleyball around the nation

Outcomes and performances of note from Sunday:

The line of day goes to DePaul’s Jill Pressly, who had a career-high 29 kills, hitting .333, with three aces and 10 digs in a five-set win over Bradley. The 5-foot-11 outside hitter is a fifth-year from Plano, Texas … Props, too, to CSUN’s Amaris Smith. She had 29 kills Saturday in a win over San Diego State and then had 27 more Sunday in a four-set loss to Idaho State to go with 10 digs and three blocks … In Oregon’s sweep of Long Beach State, Colby Neal had 13 kills in 14 errorless swings, two digs and seven blocks.

Sixth-ranked Louisville hit .371 and swept No. 15 Tennessee as Sofia Maldonado Diaz had 11 kills and hit .429 and Charitie Luper had 10 kills with one error in 19 attacks to hit .474 to go with an ace, 12 digs and a block … 

No. 20 Florida State beat No. 25 Georgia in four. Audrey Koenig led FSU with 15 kills, an ace, eight digs and three blocks … In South Carolina’s four-set win over Duke, Riley Whitesides had 23 kills, 11 digs and a block … 

Baylor swept Campbell and Allie Sczech had 12 kills with one error in 25 swings and two blocks … Colorado hit .375 in its sweep of Rutgers which included Ana Burilovic having 13 kills, hitting .458, with nine digs and a block … Kansas hit .474 in a sweep of Colgate. Ayah Elnady had 12 kills with one error in 24 attacks … Arizona State hit .479 in a sweep of California Baptist … Eleven Wildcats had kills as Kentucky hit .369 in a sweep of Morehead State …

Purdue hit .450 in a sweep of UC Davis as Raven Colvin had 12 kills with one error in 15 swings and four blocks, one solo, and Eva Hudson had 15 kills, hit .433, and had nine digs and a block … Oregon hit .375 in a sweep of Long Beach State and, as noted above, Colby Neal had 13 kills in 14 swings with no errors. Noemie Glover had seven kills with one error in 14 swings and three blocks … Florida hit .361 in a sweep of Michigan State … Georgia Tech hit .367 and got 23 kills from Larissa Mendes, who hit .500, in a four-set win over NM State … Towson improved to 4-0 and hit .367 in a sweep of Morgan State as Victoria Barrett had 14 kills, hit .417, and had seven dig and five blocks, one solo … 

Southern Illinois beat Oral Roberts in five and Annabelle Sulish had 19 kills, hit .485, and had an ace, 10 digs and three blocks … San Diego State hit .366 in a sweep of Seattle U. Talea Mitchell had 16 kills with no errors in 23 attacks and six blocks, one solo … UNLV hit .438 in a sweep of Pacific including Alondra Alarcon getting 10 kills with one error in 15 attacks … Fresno State beat Grand Canyon in five. Fresno’s Ella Rud had 23 kills, an ace, 13 digs and four blocks, and GCU’s Tatum Parrott had 21 kills, an assist, two aces, 15 digs and three blocks.

AVP Chicago Open

In the women’s final, it was a repeat result of the round of 16 in last month’s Paris Olympics as Canadians Brandie Wilkerson and Melissa Humana-Paredes defeated Taryn Kloth and Kristen Nuss 21-17, 17-21, 15-13. In the Olympics the score was 21-19, 21-18.

Wilkerson and Humana-Paredes, who defeated Toni Rodriguez and Geena Urango 21-16, 21-14 in the semifinals, took home $15,000, while TKN made $10K. Kloth and Nuss knocked out fellow Olympians Kelly Cheng and Sara Hughes in the semifinals 15-21, 21-18, 15-13.

The Canadians won all five of their matches, all but one in three sets. That included an earlier 17-21, 21-17, 15-7 win over Rodriguez-Urango and a 23-21, 13-21, 15-8 win over Cheng-Hughes.

USA men’s Olympians Andy Benesh and Miles Partain, who made it to the Olympics quarterfinals, defeated Taylor Crabb and Taylor Sander 21-15, 21-15 for the men’s title. In the semifinals, they beat Tim Bomgren and Troy Field 29-27, 21-15. The Taylors advanced with a 21-15, 12-21, 15-7 victory over Olympians Chase Budinger and Miles Evans.

Click here for the complete results: https://avp.com/brackets/

USA wins in Paralympics sitting volleyball

The USA women had a whopping 28 aces Sunday in their 25-5, 25-1, 25-5 victory over France. The Americans are 1-1 and finish pool play Tuesday against Italy (1-1). The winner goes to the semifinals.

Click here for more from USA Volleyball.

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