Volleyball Today: Just another NCAA Friday, with array of upsets and reverse sweeps

Fridays seem never to disappoint in NCAA Division I volleyball for unpredictability and excitement.

And here you go, after a Friday in which most teams were playing their first conference matches of the 2024 season:

Unranked Auburn not only won at VolleyballMag Super 16 Media Poll No. 13 Kentucky, the Tigers pulled off a reverse sweep.

SMU, No. 23 in the AVCA top 25, swept at VBM No. 12 Georgia Tech.

Baylor, No. 19 in the AVCA poll, knocked off VBM No. 14 Arizona State.

UC Irvine improved to 2-43 against Hawai’i by also pulling off a reverse sweep in Honolulu.

Virginia improved to 11-1 with a reverse ACC sweep at Wake Forest.

Syracuse (12-1) took its first loss by getting swept at North Carolina and so did UConn (12-1), which was swept by Marquette.

N.C. Central won a MEAC reverse sweep against visiting Norfolk State.

Line of the night: Tori Hester had 30 kills for Troy in its five-set Sun Belt win over South Alabama. She hit .361 and had an ace, 13 digs and three blocks.

Recaps and top performances follow in this all-NCAA edition of Volleyball Today, but first a look at Saturday’s schedule.

NCAA volleyball Saturday

There are five Big Ten matches, starting with VBM No. 10 Purdue desperately needing a victory at No. 16 Minnesota. Seventh-ranked Wisconsin is at Northwestern, No. 11 Oregon is home for Indiana, Washington entertains Illinois and Iowa goes to Maryland. 

The two Big 12 matches show AVCA No. 17 BYU home for Texas Tech and West Virginia at Iowa State. 

AVCA No. 25 Miami was supposed to play host to No. 18 Florida State in the lone ACC match of the day, but because of the hurricane that one is at noon Eastern Sunday. 

There are no SEC matches on this football Saturday.

The only other ranked team in action is No. 24 Dayton, which plays host to Rhode Island.

Unbeatens watch: In addition to Washington, 12-0 South Dakota State is at Denver. San Jose State (9-0) was scheduled to be home for Boise State, but Boise State has forfeited. 

This is the statement from Boise State Athletics

“Boise State volleyball will not play its scheduled match at San José State on Saturday, Sept. 28. Per Mountain West Conference policy, the Conference will record the match as a forfeit and a loss for Boise State. The Broncos will next compete on Oct. 3 against Air Force.”

No other explanation was given, although news reports and comments on social media

suggest that Boise State won’t play San Jose State because it has a trans player on its team. 

Let us say here that if that is the case, few players in the NCAA hit as hard as many of the men’s coaches and/or men’s practice players employed by many of the top teams. If that is the reason for the move, the decision by Boise State is shameful.  

Two squads with strong records —  Old Dominion (11-2) at Georgia Southern (10-1) — were scheduled for back-to-back Sun Belt matches but they were canceled because of the hurricane. They will not be rescheduled. Other matches in the Southeast were affected, including all three Big South matches getting postponed.

Winless watch: 0-14 Hampton is at Hofstra, 0-12 Navy is at Colgate and 0-10 Marist is at Niagara.

ACC, B1G, Big 12, SEC 

ACC: Top-ranked Pittsburgh swept Clemson to improve to 11-0. Olivia Babcock had 15 kills, hit .406 and had three aces, six digs and three blocks, one solo. No. 3 Stanford won in four at Notre Dame as Elia Rubin had 17 kills, hit .325, and had an ace, seven digs and five blocks. No. 4 Louisville hit .172 and swept visiting Cal, which hit minus .029. SMU hit .400 and won 25-22, 25-20, 25-21 at Georgia Tech behind 14 kills each by Naya Shime and Maya Tabron. North Carolina is 9-1 after dealing Syracuse its first defeat 25-14, 25-9, 25-22. Safi Hampton had 11 kills, hit .320, and had an ace, eight digs and a block. Duke beat visiting Boston College in five, NC State swept Virginia Tech, and Virginia is 11-1 after its 13-25, 24-26, 25-23, 25-16, 15-7 victory at Wake Forest. Virginia, off to its best start since 2003, got 11 kills and six blocks from Abby Tadder. Lauryn Bowie had 10 kills and seven blocks, two solo.

BIG TEN: Second-ranked Nebraska battled to a 25-22, 25-10, 23-25, 25-22 victory over visiting UCLA as the Huskers improved to 11-1 and Taylor Landfair, the transfer from Minnesota, made her first significant impact. She came into the game in the first set and finished with 13 kills and hit .429 after having one error in 29 attacks to go with two digs and four blocks. Landfair, who has played sparingly, had a total of 28 kills in Nebraska’s previous 11 matches. Andy Jackson had 13 kills and six blocks. UCLA’s Cheridyn Leverette had 17 kills, 11 digs and three blocks. No. 11 Oregon is 9-1 after sweeping Illinois, which hit .099. No. 20 USC beat visiting Ohio State 19-25, 25-21, 25-20, 20-25, 15-13. Ally Batenhorst had 15 kills for USC and Emily Londot had 15 for the Buckeyes to go with an assist, two aces, 11 digs and 10 blocks, one solo. Michigan is 11-1 after sweeping Michigan State, which hit .071, as Allison Jacobs had 14 kills, hit .333, and had two assists, four digs and three blocks. And Washington beat visiting Indiana 25-18, 25-20, 25-18 to get to 11-0 as the Huskies hit .337. Emoni Bush led with 11 kills, hitting .310, and had an ace, four blocks and two digs. 

BIG 12: No. 9 Kansas beat Houston in four as Toyosi Onabanjo had 13 kills with one error in 22 swings, a dig and five blocks. Baylor upset visiting Arizona State 25-21, 25-22, 17-25, 25-17 as five players had eight or more kills, 12 by Allie Sczech. She had one error in 26 attacks and four digs. Geli Cyr had 17 kills for ASU to go with an assist, an ace and 12 digs. TCU swept Arizona as Melanie Parra had 17 kills, hit .385, and had four of her team’s nine aces, 10 digs and a block. Kansas State swept visiting UCF as Liz Gregorski had 14 kills, hit .306, and had three aces, six digs and two blocks.

SEC: Auburn won 21-25, 18-25, 25-16, 25-20, 18-16 at Kentucky, which it beat for the first time since 2010. Madison Scheer led the Tigers with 17 kills, hitting .342, and she had six blocks and a dig. Bella Bell, playing at her old school, had 12 kills with two errors in 23 attacks, two digs and four blocks. Brooklyn DeLeye had 21 kills for Kentucky to go with an assist, four of her team’s six aces and 10 digs. Eighth-ranked Texas won in four at Texas A&M as three players had 11 kills each, Devin Kahahawai, Reagan Rutherford and Madi Skinner (who had 10 errors). Missouri swept at LSU as Mychael Vernon had 17 kills with one error in 25 attacks to hit .640 and Mississippi State won in four at South Carolina.

Around the nation

In the American Athletic, Rice won in five at Tulane despite the Green Wave getting 27 kills from Avery Burks, who had 13 digs and a block. Also in the AAC, Tulsa beat UAB in five as Marta Pecalli had 26 digs, five assists and two aces … Courtney Jones had 28 kills and Lipscomb teammate Karlie McNabb had 27 as the Bisons won their ASUN match in five at Eastern Kentucky. Jones hit .345 and had three aces, 10 digs and a block, and McNabb hit .533 and had two assists, an ace and eight digs …  Dayton improved to 11-1 with an A10 sweep of Rhode Island, which hit minus .046. Also in the Atlantic 10, Saint Louis got 24 kills from Addy Brus in a five-set win over Fordham, to go with two assists, an ace, 15 digs and two blocks, one solo … 

In the Big East, No. 6 Creighton swept visiting Providence, which hit minus .033, and Marquette gave UConn its first defeat … UC Irvine won 21-25, 22-25, 26-24, 25-18, 15-13 at Hawai’i in the Big West. Hunter Riedl led the Anteaters with 21 kills, hitting .415, and had five blocks and five digs. Also in the Big West, Cal Poly hit .375 in its sweep of CSUN as Lizzy Markovska had 11 kills, hit .375 and had seven digs … Stony Brook won its CAA match in five at William & Mary as Kali Moore had 28 kills, an ace, 10 digs and a block. Also in the CAA, Hofstra hit .378 and swept Hampton to drop the Pirates to 0-14 … Manu Johnson had 24 kills for Kennesaw State in its five-set Conference USA win over NM State. She hit .315 and had an assist, four aces, 10 digs and six blocks, one solo. Leah Freeman had 25 digs, three assists and a dig … 

In the Horizon League, Madi Malone had 23 kills for Milwaukee in its five-set win over Oakland and Cleveland State beat Northern Kentucky in five despite UNK’s Joy Banks getting 24 kills while hitting .350 to go with an assist, two aces, 15 digs and two blocks. Cleveland State’s Emma Walker had 27 digs, five assists and four of her team’s 12 aces … 

Bowling Green vs. Ball State in the MAC is always something and Friday BGSU won 20-25, 25-18. 30-28, 17-25, 15-11 at Muncie as five players had nine or more kills, 17 by Mia Tyler … N.C. Central came back for a 19-25, 24-26, 25-23, 25-21, 15-13 MEAC victory over visiting Norfolk State as Kamren Harper had 25 kills for the winners, hitting .438, while Norfolk’s Gabrielle Gilbert had 24 kills, an assist, two aces, a solo block and 11 digs. NCC’s Gabriela Felix-Baeza had 24 digs and six assists … 

There were some big Missouri Valley numbers as Evansville got 29 kills from Guila Cardona in a five-set Missouri Valley win over visiting Valparaiso. Also in the Valley, Iva Popovic had 25 kills for Bradley in a five-set win over Belmont as she hit .358 and had two assists, two aces, 18 digs and a block, and Northern Iowa swept Southern Illinois as Kira Fallert had 18 kills, hit .421, and had 19 digs  … Tennessee Tech improved to 12-1 with an OVC five-set win at Tennessee State as Madolyn Isringhausen had 23 kills, hit .300, and had 10 digs and four blocks, one solo … Navy dropped to 0-12 by losing in five at Army West Point despite Ava Toppin having 13 kills in 242 errorless attacks in the Patriot League match … In Florida A&M’s five-set SWAC win at Jackson State, Iyonnie Sanford had 22 kills, hit .425, and had three digs and a block. Also in the SWAC, Bethune-Cookman swept Mississippi Valley as Ktyal Price had 10 kills in 11 errorless attacks … In Texas State’s five-set Sun Belt win over Louisiana, Alyssa Ortego had 27 digs and four assists.

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