Sept. 25, 2010

Box Score

Champaign, Ill. - Ordinarily Saturday night's match with Ohio State, a team picked fourth in the Big Ten and hovering around the Top 25, could have been that letdown match after such an emotional victory over No. 2 Penn State Friday. But Illini head coach Kevin Hambly has preached that in order to win the Big Ten, there will be battles every night and the Illini responded with a workmanlike straight sets 25-23, 25-9, 25-22 victory over the Buckeyes.

Illinois now has won five straight matches in the series and improves to 10-2 overall and 2-0 in the Big Ten. Ohio State falls to 13-2, 1-1 in the league. The crowd of 2,608 included many Chinese students and dignitaries as well as Chancellor Robert Easter on Chinese-American Unity Night.

"2-0 is great any weekend because it's not easy," Hambly said. "The conference is a grind because you play everyone twice and it's always a battle. So whatever wins you get, you're happy with them."

Junior Colleen Ward continued her All-America caliber play, leading the team for the second night in a row in kills with 14, while hitting .444. The Illini offense had a nice night overall, hitting .364. compared to Ohio State's .180.

"I think (setter) Hillary (Haen) did a great job of moving the ball around," senior Laura DeBruler said. "She got the ball to pretty much every single hitter at some point and they usually had one blocker. That made it really easy to score."

Illinois trailed early in set one, as Ohio State pushed to leads of 9-6 and 13-10, but Ward served three straight points, scoring on a kill from the back row in one of them. The Illini never trailed in any set after that.

"I thought Ohio State came out really fast against us and we just had to slow it down especially after the first set," Ward said.

DeBruler had eight kills on the night, leaving her just four shy of Mary Eggers on Illinois' all-time career kills list. For DeBruler, who missed the past two weeks with mono, it was about getting her jumping legs and energy back.

"When she had to, she could dig in and get more out of herself," Hambly said of DeBruler's play on back-to-back nights. "That's a good sign that she's getting past her illness. If you had told me we got a `W,' I'd take it, to wrap it up in three, that's the cherry on top. I thought it was great for Laura not to have to exert energy in that second set."

Illinois dominated the second set and took advantage of just enough edge in the serve/pass game to eke out sets one and three. Ohio State was able to run middle at times with Kelli Barhorst tying for the Ohio State lead with seven kills while hitting .545, but the block of Michelle Bartsch (7 kills, .462, 3 blocks) and Johannah Bangert (4 kills, .500, 3 blocks) slowed the attack down enough.

Illinois used a 10-1 run in set two to take firm control of the set. Ward and freshman Jennifer Bonilla (11 digs) served five straight points each as the Illini jumped to a 15-2 lead. In fact setter Haen (33 assists) was the only player to serve in the second rotation.

Ohio State kept set three close by matching Illinois on side-out percentage, but at 16-16, the Illini went on a mini 4-1 run and eventually extended the lead to 23-19.

Illinois travels to Wisconsin on Wednesday night before hosting Northwestern on Saturday, Oct. 2.