Oct. 8, 2005
Normal, Ill. -
Riding a string of five straight Missouri Valley Conference match wins and 13 straight conference game wins, the Illinois State University volleyball team faces a showdown with a just-as-hot, I-74 rival Bradley at 2 p.m. Sunday in Redbird Arena. The Braves are 6-0 in the Valley and have won eight matches in a row since Braves senior Lindsay Stalzer moved from middle blocker to outside hitter.
Powered by a convincing 3-0 win over Northern Iowa on Friday, Illinois State has been dominating at home, going 27-2 over the past three seasons at Redbird Arena. Lately, the `Birds have been winning with whatever weapons they needed. Against UNI, it was a defense that pressured the Panthers into more hitting errors (30) than kills (25) in the match. On the road at Evansville and Southern Illinois, the Redbirds averaged more than 20 digs per game. Against Drake and Creighton, ISU's high-powered offense prevailed.
The Redbirds, 9-6, 5-2 in the Valley, have been a come-from-behind team lately. At Southern Illinois last week, ISU trailed 18-11 in game two and 19-12 in game three, but still won both. At Evansville, they had to stave-off four UE serves for game point in game two before coming back to win. Against UNI, the `Birds trailed 16-10 and 26-24 in game two before scoring the final six points to win. The Panthers had an 8-4 lead in game three before a 21-3 Redbird explosion put ISU in command.
Redbird coach Sharon Dingman has some mixed feelings about her team's comeback ability.
"Sometimes, I feel like we're a better team five points behind than five points ahead," said Dingman, who earned her 100th win as Redbird head coach on Friday. `But our players understand that there are no six-point plays in volleyball--you have to play it point-by-point to win."
Speaking of points, Stalzer already has accounted for nearly 500 of them hitting, blocking and serving for Bradley. She is No. 11 in Missouri Valley Conference history in kills, with 1,606 in her career--12th in Valley history. Dingman thought it was a brilliant move by Bradley mentor Scott Luster, whose Braves are 11-6 overall after a 3-6 start.
"They tried to move Lindsay from middle to outside last year and it didn't work out," said Dingman . "So give Scott credit for not only being willing to try it again, but also convincing his team it would work. Lindsey takes a lot of swings, but she also has a great jump serve and is a six-rotation player."
The other reason for Bradley's fast start is defense.
"They are just digging a lot of balls," said Dingman. "It's a different team defensively than last year. Players are performing in their roles."
Illinois State has balanced firepower to test that defense. With Laura Doornbos (1,243) and Emily Kabbes (1,014) already over the 1,000 career kill mark, ISU junior Savannah Knowles (841) is knocking on the door and sophomore Kari Staehlin (465) looks like a shoo-in to be half-way to 1,000 before her sophomore year is finished. Together, they have collected 3,564 kills at Illinois State.
