No. 17 Northern Iowa started fast and stayed strong in beating Illinois State 30-13, 30-17, 30-23 to join Southwest Missouri State in the title game of the 2001 State Farm-Missouri Valley Conference Tournament Friday at Redbird Arena
We wanted to come in here (Redbird Arena) and make a statement, said Northern Iowa head coach Bobbi Petersen. I feel like we are doing that now. Anytime we hit over .300 we feel we can do well. We served extremely tough tonight and we were happy with our start.
Kim Kester led the Panthers with 15 kills and Molly OBrien added 13 as UNI won its 10th straight match. Megan OConnell led the Redbirds with nine kills, while Jenny Kabbes had eight. Northern Iowa outhit Illinois State .392 and .116 for the match and had 12 service aces
Northern Iowa served better than any team weve faced this year, said Illinois State head coach Sharon Dingman. I think we have a pretty good passing game and they aced us 12 times. We came out to play too late. For anybody to beat that team, they are going to have to play very well.
Northern Iowa, 28-1, jumped all over the Redbirds while dealing ISU its worst game loss of the season, leading 15-2 in game one and scoring 17 points before their first hitting error of the match. Kester and McCaffrey had four kills each for UNI, which hit .343 for the game. Illinois State battled to an 11-11 tie in game two before the Panthers reeled off nine unanwered points on the strength of Kim McCaffreys serving.
The Redbirds finish at 16-14 as Northern Iowa beat the Birds for the 12th straight time in the series.
Earlier in the evening, Rese McNatt had 11 kills and Linette White and Erin Murphy contributed 10 apiece as No. 2 seed Southwest Missouri State defeated No. 3 seed Bradley 30-26, 30-24, 30-24 to advance to the championship match of the Missouri Valley Conference Volleyball Tournament. SMS will play Northern Iowa in the championship Saturday night at 6:05 p.m.
It is nice to beat them 3-0, said SMS head coach Melissa Stokes, whose teams were previously 0-6 in Redbird Arena. I thought we passed pretty well. This is the first time that I looked on the scoreboard and was happy to see the Redbirds (home team) with more points.
The Bears, 25-6, took advantage of four kills by Erin Murphy and 12 Bradley hitting errors to win game one 30-26. Game two proved to be a hard-fought battle, but SMS prevailed with a 30-24 victory behind five kills by Linette White. Five kills by White and 8 digs by Emily Hodel helped SMS get ahead early and stay ahead in game two. Game three brought more of the same as SMS completed the match with another 30-24 win.
We had opportunities, but didnt take advantage of them, said Bradley head coach Scott Luster. A couple who played well this morning (against Indiana State) could not play at the same level tonight. I think fatigue was part of it. I wish SMS the best in the tournament.
Bradley finished its season with a record of 24-8.
In the afternoon session, Bradley advanced with a 3-2 win over Indiana State. Sam Hardwick had a triple-double with 27 digs, 10 blocks and 44 set assists to lead the Braves to a 30-23, 30-32, 30-26, 26-30, 15-7 win.
Illinois State advanced to the semi-finals with a 3-0 win over Creighton. Abby Lewis had 15 kills and 22 digs while Erin Jones added 10 kills and 14 digs.
