No. 1 Nebraska volleyball started slowly but finished strong in a home sweep over a hard-hitting Oregon team.
The Huskers (22-0, 12-0 Big Ten) swept the Ducks 25-21, 25-20, 25-13 at the Devaney Center on Sunday afternoon. Oregon (13-9, 4-8) is only the fourth team to reach the 20-point mark in a set against the Huskers since the sweep streak (now at 13) began and the first to do so twice since the five-set win against Creighton.
“Oregon was playing really, really well, and we were talking about them all week, just how they’re much better than their record, and when they’re playing well, they’d be really hard to stop,” Coach Dani Busboom Kelly said. “They’re one of the hardest hitting teams in the Big Ten and a great serving team, so we knew they’d be a challenge. I thought we started a hair slow, but we hung in there and really hit our groove the longer it went.”
Nebraska hit .405 for the match, the third time this season the Huskers have hit over .400. Bergen Reilly finished with 26 assists, five digs and two kills.
Taylor Landfair led the attack with 10 kills on .400 hitting, her fifth straight match hitting that mark or better. Over her past six matches, Landfair is averaging 2.24 kills per set on .438 hitting.
“Just super low-error and really smart taking advantage of some of her matchups,” Busboom Kelly said of the sixth-year senior. “That’s been really impressive and fun to see.”
Harper Murray added nine kills on .391 hitting and a team-high nine digs. She only finished with two stuff blocks (one solo), but Busboom Kelly said her block played a big part in holding Oregon’s Alanah Clemente to .077 hitting.
“She got burned pretty good early, and we knew we were going to have to be great against Clemente, because she’s a stud and she does a really nice job,” Busboom Kelly said. “I just thought Harper did a great job of lining her up and, even if she didn’t block it, making her think.”
Virginia Adriano finished with eight kills on .500 hitting and three block assists while Rebekah Allick contributed five kills on .444 hitting and five blocks (one solo).
Nebraska held Oregon to .162 hitting. The Ducks served five aces, one more than Nebraska, but also racked up 13 errors (seven more than the Huskers).
Oregon delivered the first blow of the day with some aggressive serving early from Valentina Vaulet (producing an overpass for a kill and an ace on the first two points), but Nebraska settled in and put together a 7-1 run to take an 8-4 lead.
The Ducks stemmed the tide and turned it into a dogfight with a pair of lead changes and eight ties, the last coming at 18-18, before Nebraska took control. Adriano gave the Huskers the lead for good with a kill and Teraya Sigler followed with an ace. The teams traded sideouts from there until Murray notched a solo block to give Nebraska set point then induced an overpass for a Jackson kill to end it.
“I honestly think it was just a switch in my mentality,” Murray said of her in-game blocking improvement. “Early on in the game, that setter was getting me and I was struggling to be there on time. So I think that was just a switch in mentality for me and really focusing on being early and being on time to my block, because we have a good defense back there, but it’s not always going to be there to save you. That’s on me, but I think I got better throughout the game.”
The Huskers hit .290 and held Oregon to .195. Murray led the way with for kills on .444 hitting. Both teams recorded two aces, but Nebraska did so with only one error while Oregon had four.
The second set was close throughout as well with nine ties and four lead changes. Neither team led by more than two points until Nebraska surged ahead late with a 5-0 run featuring a kill and a block assist each from Adriano and Allick and a pair of Duck attack errors.
After a pair of sideouts for each team, Nebraska closed the set on a 3-1 run to take the 2-0 lead into the intermission. Nebraska hit .450 to Oregon’s .226. The Ducks had six service errors in the set while Murray tacked four more kills on to her tally.
The Huskers made their move much earlier in set three. After trading points to open the game, the Huskers scored four straight including an ace from Olivia Mauch to take the lead for good. Nebraska used a 5-1 run including a pair of Landfair kills to extend the lead to eight and open the floodgates, turning the final game into a rout.
Landfair and Adriano both came live, notching five kills apiece as the Huskers hit .500 with only one attack error. Oregon hit .037 with only seven kills.
Landfair said Nebraska’s practices play a big part in the Huskers’ ability to wear down opponents, and the head coach praised their ability to make adjustments as the game goes to play their best volleyball late.
“I think we do a great job of adjusting quickly, and we have so many high-IQ players that they know what they’re doing wrong, and they can change,” Busboom Kelly said. “Then I think our serving, we just get better as the games go on, and you’ve seen that recently. We might start out slow and then finish super strong from the service line.”
Murray said the Huskers want to work on reaching their third-set level of play earlier in matches, and they’ll get an opportunity to do that next week with Illinois visiting Lincoln on Thursday before a trip to Minneapolis to face the Golden Gophers next weekend.
