Nov. 16, 2014
New Brunswick, N.J. - No. 12 Illinois came away with a sweep in its first-ever visit to Rutgers, defeating the Scarlet Knights, 3-0 (25-11, 25-23, 25-23). The Illini cruised to victory in the first set, but battled Rutgers down the stretch in the second and had to overcome a large early deficit in the third, yet the Orange and Blue were able to hang on to win all three sets. With the win, the Illini improve to 21-6 (13-3 Big Ten) while Rutgers slips to 7-22 (0-16 Big Ten).
"I thought we came out and played hard and put a lot of pressure on them to start with," said head coach Kevin Hambly, "and then human nature again kicked in, which is something we've been trying to fight, and we relaxed a little bit. They played hard and they scored, and I'm not so sure that we had a good plan going into it or that we executed it well. They did things that were different than what we thought they would do in system, and our response to it wasn't as quick as we needed it to be."
"I liked the way we finished sets; we were calm and collected and we relaxed and made plays, which was why we won the sets that we did that were tight. Overall, I thought we could play better and we could have been better prepared."
Sophomore Michelle Strizak more than doubled her career high, hitting .435 with a match-best 13 kills and a solo block. Jocelynn Birks followed with 10 kills and a block and Liz McMahon hit .348 with nine kills. Alexis Viliunas led the Illini to a .315 hitting percentage with 31 assists and five digs and matched her personal best with three kills on three swings. Brandi Donnelly was the sole player with double-digit digs, tallying 11. Illinois posted five service aces in the match, including three by Julia Conard.
"(Strizak) hit a good number and had a lot of kills," said Hambly. "Lizzie was on track and was tough for them to stop. Defensively I thought we were just okay. We really relied a lot on our offense, and I thought we passed fine which gave us some opportunities, but we had way too much reliance on just using our arms and putting balls away as opposed to playing the whole game."
Micaela Anderson led the Scarlet Knights with 11 kills and nine digs, and Megan Stephenson hit .500 with seven kills and no errors. Nicole Bayer (19) and Talia Holze (12) split setting duties, and libero Ali Schroeter posted eight digs. Anderson and Eden Frazier each had two aces in the match, along with one from Holze.
"Anderson and Stephenson, both of them are good," said Hambly. "We didn't have a great plan for them. Overall, we did a good job with middles and right sides, which we thought were their strengths coming into it, but it turns out that their lefts were a lot better than we thought."
Rutgers tied the score at 3-3 on an ace by Holze, but a Birks kill brought Conard in to serve, who led the Illini to a 9-3 lead with the help of two aces. Illinois continued to cruise, out-hitting Rutgers .609 to .000 and taking the first set, 25-11.
The second set was a nail-biter to the end, as Illinois saw an early 7-4 lead erased as a pair of Illini attack errors put Rutgers ahead, 17-16. The Scarlet Knights pushed further ahead, 21-19, on a block and an Anderson kill, but back-to-back kills by McMahon tied the score at 21. Another McMahon kill knotted the score at 22, and an error and a kill by Anderson tied the score once more at 23. Illinois executed down the stretch, as Viliunas and Birks nailed back-to-back kills to escape with the 25-23 victory.
Rutgers took control early in the first set, cruising to a 9-4 lead and forcing Illinois to call a timeout. Strizak returned from the break with a kill, but back-to-back slams by Matthews helped Rutgers to its largest lead of the set, 14-6. Illinois did not back down, and a service ace by Conard, her third of the match, sparked an Illini comeback, as kills by Birks and McMahon tied the score at 19 and a Rutgers error gave Illinois its first lead of the set, 20-19. The two teams traded points after that, and soon the score was knotted up at 23. Just like the previous frame, Illinois exploded for the final two points to complete the comeback and sweep the match, 25-23.
Illinois' three-match road swing continues on Wednesday, Nov. 19, when the Illini travel to Madison to take on No. 4 Wisconsin, who maintains sole possession of first place in the Big Ten standings with just one conference loss. The match will be streamed live on BTN Plus beginning at 7 p.m.
