Sept. 26, 2006

ILLINOIS AT AT GLANCE

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Illinois (9-3, 0-2) at Northwestern (6-5, 0-2)
When: Sept. 27, 7 p.m.
Where: Welsh-Ryan Arena, Evanston, Ill.
Radio: WDWS Radio (Dave Loane & Steve Layman)
Series Notes: Illinois leads the all-time series 40-21, but Northwestern claimed both matches in 2005...Illinois is 14-6 vs. the Wildcats under Don Hardin... Wildcats head coach Keylor Chan is 5-7 vs. Illinois.
More on last year's meetings: The Wildcats defeated the Illini 30-18, 31-33, 31in Champaign. Rachel VanMeter had 24 kills in 82 attacks for Illinois. In game four Illinois overcame an 8-1 advantage to claim the game and send it to game five. Northwestern won in Evanston, 30-21, 25-30, 30-26, 30-25. Northwestern hit .324 for the match, including .389 in the first game and .444 in game four.

Alde faces former team: Stephanie Alde played for Northwestern the past two seasons, where she posted 81 kills, 40 blocks, 18 digs, and 11 aces as a freshman and 17 kills as a sophomore. She has more kills in her first 12 matches as an Illini than she did in two years at Northwestern. Alde ranks third on the Illini with 117 kills.

More on Northwestern: Northwestern made just its second NCAA Tournament appearance last season and won its first ever tournament match, defeating Texas A&M in five games before falling to Notre Dame. The Wildcats returned five starters from that team. They are 6-5 on the season with three of the losses coming to ranked teams -- No. 8 Stanford, No. 9, and No. 14 Wisconsin. They have a win over No. 24 Arizona.

Chicago area connections: Illinois will be playing in the Chicago area near the hometowns of several of its players -- Beth Vrdsky and Meghan Macdonald (Downers Grove South), Amy Palash (St. Francis), Stephanie Obermeier (Prairie Ridge), Stephanie Alde (Libertyville), Lizzie Bazzetta (Naperville North) and Rachel Henderson (Wheaton-Warrenville South).

Iowa (11-3, 0-2) at Illinois (9-3, 0-2) ,br> When: Sept. 30, 7 p.m.
Where: Huff Hall, Champaign, Ill.
Radio: WDWS Radio (Dave Loane & Steve Layman)
Series Notes: Illinois leads the all-time series, 42-13 and is 16-4 under Don Hardin. The teams split last year's meeting with Iowa winning 30-27, 30-26, 35-33 in Champaign and the Illini winning 21-30, 30-26, 30-24, 30-26 in Iowa City.

More on last year's meetings: Illinois secured its 20th winning season in the last 23 years in the season finale last year year. Rasa Virsilaite had 23 kills and 11 digs while hitting .442. The victory for Iowa was the first over the Illini in Champaign since 1994 and the first time the Hawkeyes had taken a game at Huff Hall since 2000.

More on the Hawkeyes: Iowa is off to an 11-3 start and is 0-2 in the Big Ten following home losses last weekend to Penn State and Ohio State. Iowa took game one from No. 12 Ohio State, before succumbing in four games. The Hawkeyes only other loss came to Iowa State.

Getting over the hump: Illinois played competitive volleyball in five of the six games last week, only to lose in three to Wisconsin and Minnesota. Against Wisconsin, Illinois led 14-10 in game one, 16-11 in game two, and 23-21 in game three. Against Minnesota, the Illini were up 16-14 in game one and 18-16 in game two.

Turner paces Illinois over the weekend: Kayani Turner had 32 kills in two matches over the weekend, leading the team in kills both nights.

Blocking woes: One of the reasons for the Badger and Gopher success was because of the block. Those teams out-blocked Illinois by a combined 23-12.

Illinois among ace, assists leaders: Illinois ranks 28th in the nation in aces per game at 2.28. The Illini are the only Big Ten school ranked in that category. Illinois is also 29th nationally in assists (14.84), one of five Big Ten schools listed. Michigan State leads the nation at 16.6 per game.

Illinois reaches Stuff Huff goal thanks to large student section
The Illini volleyball program set out to break 3,000 in attendance for the first round of the State Farm Illini Classic. The crowd of 3,129 was the largest since Nov. 6, 1993 when the Illini drew 3,161 vs. Minnesota. The crowd was also the first officially over 3,000 since Nov. 6, 1999 when 3,083 saw the Illini take on Penn State.
• Although no records are kept, the crowd was likely the largest student crowd in the history of Huff Hall. A total of 1,682 students used their student IDs to see the Illini take on ISU.

Vicki Brown earns two Tournament MVP honors: Vicki Brown earned the MVP honors at the State Farm Illini Classic after amassing 45 kills and nine blocks.
• Brown earned the same honor after hitting .514 at Marquette.
• Brown has had been in double digits in kills in each of the first six matches and has at least 15 kills in four of the first six.
• In the first match of the Marquette Kick-Off Tournament, Brown had 13 kills with no errors in 15 attempts during the final three games of the match for a .867 attack percentage. She hit .667 overall for the match and .514 for the tournament.

Bazzetta posts double doubles: Lizzie Bazzetta has five double doubles on the season. She also posted three straight matches with at least 60 assists -- vs. Wichita State, Charleston and Dayton.

Beth Vrdsky featured in Big Ten's 25th Anniversary Video
This year the Big Ten is celebrating the 25th Anniversary of Big Ten Women's Athletics. One of the components of the celebration is a PSA campaign titled "This is My Big Ten Story." The conference selected 11 athletes, one from each school, past or present.

Beth Vrdsky represents Illinois as she tells of her dream of becoming a fighter pilot. One of the top rated cadets in the University of Illinois' ROTC program, Vrdsky received one of a select group of invitation to the competitive Air Force Flight School. She will begin training following graduation next year.

Air Force ties: In March, Illinois junior Beth Vrdsky got the news she's been waiting most of her life to hear - she is one of the elite that has been selected into the Air Force Academy flight school. Ever since seeing the movie "Top Gun" as a youngster, Vrdsky has aspired to one day fly a fighter jet.

Vrdsky will finish her career both academically and athletically this season, and will leave for flight school to fulfill her dream. Vrdsky is one of 520 cadets selected into flight school out of all the ROTC programs nationwide. Illinois head coach Don Hardin, an Air Force veteran himself, was there to congratulate Vrdsky.

Edinger Top Libero: Ashley Edinger, who will start at the libero position for the Fighting Illini, was named prepvolleyball.com's top libero in the nation as a senior at Michigan City (Ind.) H.S.

Reaching .300: Meghan Macdonald is trying to become just the 11th Illini in school history to hit over .300 for her career. Entering this weekend, Macdonald is hitting .287.

Reaching 1,000: With 12 digs vs. the College of Charleston, Beth Vrdsky became just the seventh player to post 1,000 digs for her career. She is sixth on Illinois' all-time digs list:

Bazzetta, Brown among nation's best: Lizzie Bazzetta is ranked fourth in the nation in assists per game at 13.72 per game. Vicki Brown ranks 20th nationally in hitting percentage at .418.