Sept. 10, 2011

Box Score | Hambly Interview | Johnson Interview

MURFREESBORO, Tenn. - It took a pair of stellar performances from Illinois' middle blockers, Erin Johnson and Anna Dorn, for the No. 4 Illini to come away with a 3-1 victory (25-17, 26-28, 25-16, 27-25) over Cal Poly (3-6) on Saturday afternoon. The Orange and Blue remain unblemished, improving to 8-0 overall after the win at Alumni Memorial Gym. Johnson hit .636, posting 15 kills in 22 swings, while Dorn hit .579, connecting on 12 kills in 19 attempts.

"It wasn't our prettiest match, but we found a way to pull it out," head coach Kevin Hambly said. "I like how we played in sets one and three, but we made way too many errors and didn't play volleyball like we needed to for two of the sets. We still need to work on that consistency for the entire match."

The Illini middles carried an offense that hit over .300 for the second match in a row, as the Orange and Blue registered a .301 attack percentage, its second best this year behind Friday night's .392. The Orange and Blue defense held an opponent under .200 for the seventh time this season, with Cal Poly only hitting .165.

Illinois' two outside hitters turned in double-digit kill performances, but each hit under .200 for the match. Senior Michelle Bartsch led the team with 16 kills while senior Colleen Ward finished with 11. Freshman Liz McMahon chipped in seven kills and was in on seven block assists. Junior setter Annie Luhrsen engineered the offensive attack with 54 assists, her best four-set assist mark thus far.

"The thing I like about this team is how much balance we have," Hambly said. "We have been trying to get our middles more involved in the offense, and Annie did that from the start. Erin and Annie carried us through the match until the end and got some big points on the block. Lizzie also did nice job down the stretch and had a big block to put us ahead. When we are passing well, we can use all of our weapons."

In the first set, Illinois picked up where they left off from the night before, jumping out of the gate with a .419 attack percentage, the squad's third-straight set over .400. Dorn was a perfect 5-for-5 in the frame on kills, Ward nailed five kills in seven swings and Bartsch added four, as the team totaled 17 kills with only four errors in 31 attempts.

The Illini had 17 kills again the second set but doubled their amount of errors, as they struggled to close out the set. Ahead 24-21, Illinois dropped three straight points and seven of the final nine, as they lost the stanza 28-26. Following the break, the Orange and Blue regained their form from set one, as they hit .333 and stepped up the defense, limiting the Mustangs to a .061 attack percentage. The Illini easily took the third set but needed to come from behind to close out the match in the fourth.

Trailing for the majority of the final frame, Illinois found itself down 21-16 but battled back to tie it at 23 apiece and then again at 25 all. McMahon subbed in for Feldman and made an immediate impact by teaming up with Dorn for the block before the Mustangs ended the match on an attack error. After tallying just five blocks in the first two sets, the Illini blockers notched four each during the final two stanzas to come away with a 13-11.5 advantage in the category.

"Our middles closed and the outside blockers stopped floating and got over in time," said Hambly of the improved blocking. "It wasn't anything magical, they just started executing."

Illinois will take on Tulsa tonight at 7:30 p.m. for the MTSU Invitational title. Both teams are 2-0 in the tournament after defeating MTSU and Cal Poly.