Nov. 22, 2008

Champaign, Ill. - Michigan State did everything it could to spoil no. 16 Illinois' senior night, but in the end, Illinois refused to give in and survived a scare from the unranked Spartans 25-22, 17-25, 28-26, 20-25, 15-11. With the victory, the Illini clinched no worse than a tie for third place in the Big Ten and improved to 22-7 overall and 13-5 in the conference.

The match lasted two and a half hours and had many twists and turns. In the third set, the Illini overcame set point against them to prevail 28-26, but the real drama came in set five. Down 9-6 in that set, Illinois scored nine of the last 11 points to take the set and the match.

"Michigan State was on fire tonight," said Illinois head coach Don Hardin. "They could do no wrong. That's as well a team has played us all year. Having said that, I'm extremely impressed with how our players handled that pressure. They battled back and didn't lose composure. Because of our ranking teams are going to play us that way."

After a timeout, sophomore Laura DeBruler got an immediate sideout with a kill from the outside, then scored on a roll shot to cut the deficit to one. Some great Illinois defense led to an MSU attack error as Illinois tied the score. The teams exchanged sideouts before Illinois went on the decisive run. DeBruler and Johannah Bangert came through with a stuff block on the first of three straight points served by one of Saturday's heroes, Abby Nelson.

A few times this year, teams have been able to neutralize DeBruler early, only to see the All-American candidate come through when it counts. Through two sets, DeBruler had five kills and was hitting just .083. However, she had four kills as Illinois won set three, then tallied six of Illinois' 15 points in the fifth set, hitting .600 in that frame. In the end, DeBruler posted her 27th career 20-kill match with 21 kills and finished the evening hitting .238 while adding 12 digs for another double-double.

Illinois used its tough blocking to pull through as well. The Illini out-blocked the Spartans, 14-7.5. Besides Bangert's nine blocks, Nelson was at the heart of that attack. The Chicago native hit .474 with 10 kills and five blocks. Sophomore Michelle Bartsch countered DeBruler with 13 kills and seven blocks.

"Abby Nelson is as competitive a player as I've ever worked with," Hardin said. "She likes getting after it."

Michigan State hit .350 in winning the fourth set 25-20. The Spartans' Vanessa King was tough to stop all night, hitting an amazing .500 in 36 swings for a team-leading 20 kills. Becca Zablis was also one of four Spartans in double figures in kills with 16. Michigan State out-dug the Illini 80-61.

In the end, the Illinois victory was a total team effort. Freshman Catherine Culligan came off the bench for three important digs in the fourth and fifth sets and senior Kayani Turner also saw action in her final regular season match. Hillary Haen paced Illinois with 32 assists while Ashley Edinger led four players in double figures in digs with 16

Afterwards, Illinois honored is three senior players and two senior managers. Senior Lizzie Bazzetta had 22 assists and says she hopes it's not her last at Huff Hall. With an RPI of 6, heading into week, Illinois is line to possibly host the first and second rounds of the NCAA Tournament in two weeks.

"I hope we'll get a chance to play at home again," Bazzetta said. "Either way, we're finishing out this year just getting better, playing our style of ball. Michigan State was relentless tonight, so pulling that out was an added bonus for us on Senior Day."

Illinois finishes the regular season next weekend at Wisconsin and Northwestern.