Volleyball Today: Another K-State reverse sweep; BYU beats Baylor; Utah thumps TCU

This is the season of the reverse sweep, when teams lose the first two matches in NCAA Division I volleyball and then win the next three.

Kansas State, which came back from 0-2 in its last match against Iowa State last Saturday, did it again Thursday, this time against visiting Cincinnati. 

It was the only reverse sweep on a night when BYU, the No. 23 team in the AVCA Poll, knocked off No. 18 Baylor and unranked but surging Utah swept visiting No. 17 TCU. Also in the Big 12, VolleyballMag Super 16 Media Poll No. 8 Kansas swept at West Virginia.

There’s now a two-way tie atop the MAC. Eastern Michigan (11-9, 5-1), which has won five of six and seven of its last nine, scored a big five-set victory at Bowling Green (10-7, 5-1), where it hadn’t won since 2015.

South Dakota (15-0) remained unbeaten by sweeping Omaha in The Summit League.

Line of the day: Colorado State lost to Boise State in five but CSU’s Malaya Jones had 28 kills, hit .382, and had two assists, 14 digs and six blocks.

We have a look at Friday’s NCAA slate in this edition of Volleyball Today and note that Athletes Unlimited begins its second round of matches when Team (Kayla) Caffey plays Team (Brittany) Abercrombie at 8 p.m. Eastern in Mesa, Arizona, followed by Team (Bethania) De La Cruz-Mejia vs. Team (Tomkom) Nootsara. 

Those four captains are the points leaders and got to choose this week’s teams for the second of the five-week season. 

Both matches can be seen on Bally regional networks and on Volleyball World TV.

NCAA volleyball Friday

Top-ranked and unbeaten Pittsburgh is off, but the rest of the ACC is in full swing, including VolleyballMag Super 16 Media Poll No. 4 Louisville at AVCA No. 21 Florida State and No. 6 Stanford home for Syracuse. No. 20 Georgia Tech plays host to Virginia Tech, Duke is at Wake Forest, North Carolina is at NC State, Notre Dame is at Miami, Virginia is at Clemson and Boston College is at Cal.

In the Big Ten, the only match between ranked teams pits No. 9 Purdue at No. 2 Nebraska. Thrid-ranked Penn State is at Michigan State, No. 10 Wisconsin is home for Maryland, No. 14 Minnesota is home for Indiana, Illinois is at Michigan and Rutgers is at Iowa.

The SEC shows No. 19 Florida home for Mississippi State, South Carolina at Georgia, Alabama at Missouri and Oklahoma at LSU.

The Big 12 is off. Iowa State was supposed to play at UCF, but that match was canceled. 

The five-match Big East slate shows No. 5 Creighton at Villanova and Marquette at St. John’s. 

Dayton of the Atlantic 10, ranked No. 22 and riding an eight-match winning streak, is home for back-to-back matches with Loyola Chicago.

There are plenty of other matches worth noting, including Towson (14-2, 5-1) at College of Charleston (13-5, 5-1) and Northeastern (7-7, 5-1) at Hofstra (9-6, 5-1) in the Big South, where five teams (Delaware is off) are tied for the lead.

There’s a big one in the Big West when UC Davis plays at Hawai’i and the two 5-0 teams in the Horizon League are in action as Milwaukee goes to Northern Kentucky and Wright State is at Youngstown State.

Georgia Southern, which has won 12 in a row and is 13-1 overall, 2-0 in the Sun Belt, is home for Troy, while Old Dominion (13-2, 2-0) goes for its 11th in a row when the Monarchs entertain App State, also 2-0.

NCAA volleyball Thursday

We’ll start with the Big 12, where BYU (10-5, 3-2) hit .404 and out-blocked visiting Baylor 10-5 to come away with a 26-24, 25-21, 25-13 sweep. The Cougars, who had 49 kills and 11 errors in 94 attacks, were led by Elli Mortensen, who had 17 kills, hit .500, and had an ace and three digds. Claire Little had 14 kills, hit .323 and had an ace and three blocks. Kjersti Strong had seven kills with one error in 14 swings and four blocks, one solo, and Brielle Kemavor had seven kills with no errors in nine attacks and six blocks, one solo. Baylor  (10-5, 2-2) got 11 kills from Elise McGhee … Utah improved to 14-2, 4-1 with its 25-22, 25-22, 25-22 sweep of visiting TCU (11-4, 3-2) for its first win over a ranked team in two years. Kamryn Gibadlo led Utah with 13 kills, hitting .333, to go with an ace, two blocks and four digs … Kansas State (5-9, 3-2), which won 19-25, 19-25, 25-22, 25-18, 19-17, got 20 kills from Aliyah Carter and 19 from Liz Gregorski, including back-to-back kills to end the match. She also had an assist, an ace, a block and 16 digs. Ella Larking had 20 digs, four assists and an ace. Cincinnati (11-4, 2-2) had one chance at match point at 14-13. The Bearcats got 20 kills from Carly Glendinning, who added an assist, an ace, six blocks and five digs. Faith Frame had 18 digs and six assists … Kansas (13-1, 3-0) won 25-20, 25-18, 25-18 at West Virginia (6-10, 0-4). Rhian Swanson led with 12 kills, hitting .346, with two digs and a block … 

In the only Big Ten match, Ohio State (8-7, 1-4) swept at Northwestern (3-10, 1-4) as Emily Londot had 15 kills in the 25-23, 25-16, 26-24 victory. Londot added an assist, two aces, six digs and five blocks, one solo as the Buckeyes climbed out of a last-place tie with idle Michigan State and Rutgers … 

Rising Eastern Michigan (11-9, 5-1) won 26-24, 17-25, 30-28, 20-25, 16-14 at Bowling Green (10-7, 5-1) as five players had nine or more kills, 15 by Abby Stanford. She hit .433 after having two errors in 33 attacks, an ace, three digs and four blocks, one solo. Hannah Blaney had 18 digs, a kill, four assist and an ace. Mia Tyler had 21 kills for Bowling Green, to go with two digs and three blocks, one solo. Jessica Andrews had seven kills and nine blocks, two solo, and Lauryn Hovey had 16 kills, three blocks and 28 digs … Also in the MAC, Toledo won 33-31, 25-17, 23-25, 25-12 over visiting Central Michigan as Taylor Alt had 18 kills with one error in 36 attacks, an assist, three aces, six digs and a block … Western Michigan swept visiting Ohio, which got 20 kills from Kam Hunt, and NIU swept Kent State as Charli Atiemo had 14 kills with one error in 30 swings to hit .433 and added an assist, three aces, a dig and two blocks … 

South Dakota State is 15-0, the only other team besides Pitt to remain unbeaten, and 4-0 in The Summit League after its 25-18, 25-21, 25-21 victory over visiting Omaha. Sylive Zgonc led with 11 kills, two assists, an ace, five digs and three blocks … Also in The Summit, North Dakota State won in five at Kansas City as Ali Hinze had 18 kills, 12 digs and two blocks and Alexis Boling had 15 kills with one error in 31 swings to hit .452 to go with four digs and two blocks … St. Thomas won in four at Oral Roberts … and South Dakota won in five at North Dakota as Kylen Sealock had 21 kills, hit .367, and added three digsd and two blocks. North Dakota’s Lauren Perugini had 18 kills, 13 digs and five blocks … 

Loyola Marymount (12-4,4-1) won the big WCC match with San Diego (8-7, 3-2) in five as Sophia Meyers had 14 kills and Paige Flickinger 13 in the 22-25, 25-21, 25-14, 20-25, 15-13 victory. USD’s Isabel Clark had 19 kills … Also in the WCC, Washington State (9-5, 4-1) kept pace as it won in four at Pacific (11-6, 1-4) behind 19 kills from Katy Ryan, who hit .421 had had three digs and three blocks, one solo. Pacific’s Alexa Edwards had 20 kills, two aces and 10 digs … San Francisco (11-5, 4-0) remained atop the league, tied with idle Pepperdine, with a four-set win at Portland. Hayden Goodman had 15 kills, hit .591, and had four digs and four blocks … Santa Clara swept at Oregon State … Saint Mary’s swept visiting Gonzaga as Genevieve Bane had 13 kills with one error in 25 attacks to hit .480 and added an assist, four digs and two blocks … 

In the Big Sky, Bri Gunderson had 20 kills, hit .531 and had an ace and 12 blocks, one solo, as Eastern Washington won in five at Montana State, which got 17 kills and seven blocks, one solo, from Joelie Spelts … Also in the Big Sky, Montana hit .375 and swept visiting Idaho, Northern Colorado did the same at Portland State as Gabi Placide had 15 kills, hit .333, and had seven digs and two blocks, and Sacramento State beat visiting Northern Arizona in four as Caitlin Volkmann had 18 kills, five aces, nine digs and two blocks … 

Long Beach State (10-5, 4-1) hit .337 and moved into a first-place Big West tie with UC Davis with its sweep at CSUN (6-10, 1-4), which hit .058 Ella Lomigora led with 10 kills and hit .600 after having one error in 15 attacks to go with three blocks. Zayna Meyer had five kills with one error in seven attacks and seven blocks, one solo … 

Colorado State (9-7, 5-1) still has the lead in the Mountain West, but lost in five to visiting Boise State (11-5, 3-1), which, when it plays, has a chance to win. Paige Bartsch had 20 kills for Boise with 10 digs and three blocks. Malaya Jones had 28 kills for Colorado State, hitting .382 to go with 14 digs and six blocks … Also in the MWC, Utah State beat visiting New Mexico in four as Mara Stiglic had 16 kills, two digs and four blocks, one solo … Nevada hit .394 and swept visiting Air Force as Gabby McLaughlin had 14 kills, hit .314 and had three digs and five blocks … Fresno State beat visiting UNLV in four as Addison Haluska had 25 kills, hit .339, and had two aces, 14 digs and three blocks, one solo. Dionii Fraga had 21 digs, four assists and four of her team’s 10 aces … and San Diego State swept at San Jose State because it did not forfeit the match. Jasmine Davis had 10 kills with one error in 18 attacks to hit .500 in the 25-21, 25-18, 25-19 victory to go with two aces and six digs … 

Lindenwood (11-7, 5-1) took over sole possession of first place in the Ohio Valley Conference with a surprising sweep of visiting Tennessee Tech (15-2, 4-1), which hit .099. Autumn Bax led the Lions with 17 kills and hit .593 after having one error in 27 attacks … In the other OVC match, Keyana Cruise had 23 kills, hit .392, and had an ace, 14 digs and three blocks in Western Illinois’ four-set win over visiting Eastern Illinois …

In SWAC play, Southern hit .333 and swept Alcorn, and Grambling got 10 kills from Essence Allen, who had one error in 23 swings, two aces and 13 digs as did the same to Arkansas-Pine Bluff … 

Samford (10-5, 4-1) won a big SoCon match when the Bulldogs beat visiting Mercer (13-4, 4-1) in four to leave four teams with one loss each in the conference. Also in the SoCon, ETSU beat The Citadel in five … 

Southland-leader Southeastern Louisiana (14-4, 6-0) hit .350 and won its 14th in a row as Cicly Hidalgo had 12 kills, hitting .385, with seven digs and three blocks, one solo, in a 25-11, 25-16, 25-21 win over visiting Nicholls … Also in the SLC, Texas A&M-Corpus Christi beat visiting Texas A&M-Commerce in four … UTRGV did the same to visiting Northwestern State as Claudia Lupescu had 21 kills, hitting .395, to go with three aces, 10 digs and three blocks … and McNeese swept at New Orleans … 

Southern Miss lost its Sun Belt match in five at Louisiana but Sadie McAda had 24 kills, 30 digs and five blocks. Louisiana’s Megan Hawkins not only had 32 assists, a block and two aces, but 24 digs  … In the other SBC match, Georgia Southern improved to 13-1 by sweeping Troy. GSU has won 12 matches and 28 sets in a row  … 

In the WAC, UT Arlington improved to 15-2, 5-0 with a sweep of visiting Seattle U. Sjakkie Donkers (All-Name Team), a freshman from the Netherlands, had 17 kills, hit .429, and added five assists, an ace, nine digs and a block … Also in the WAC, Grand Canyon won in four at Utah Tech as Tatum Parrott had 20 kills, an assist, three aces, 15 digs and three blocks, one solo … Abilene Christian won in five at Tarleton State … and Southern Utah swept visiting California Baptist.

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