Volleyball Today: Lednicky, Texas A&M upset No. 7 Texas; Stanford, Kansas roll on

Texas A&M came away with a huge upset victory Wednesday night at VolleyballMag Super 16 Media Poll No. 7 Texas on a night when the other five ranked teams in action all won. 

There was another reverse sweep when Howard of the MEAC did it to visiting UMBC of America East.

And Thursday’s schedule includes quite a few important conference matches in this all-NCAA edition of Volleyball Today:

NCAA volleyball Thursday 

The three Big Ten matches include a ranked team as No. 3 Penn State, which has won 10 in a row, makes its first L.A. trip in the B1G; No. 8 Wisconsin, which has won seven in a row, is at Indiana; and No. 14 USC is home for Michigan State.

There are three Big 12 matches. No. 12 Arizona State plays at Arizona, No. 21 Utah is at Kansas State and Texas Tech goes to Cincinnati. 

Southland Conference-leader Southeastern Louisiana, riding a 17-match winning streak, goes to Houston Christian.

UT Arlington, which has won nine in a row and holds a two-game lead in the WAC, goes to Seattle U. Second-place Grand Canyon, which lost to UTA last week, is home for third-place Utah Valley.

The Big West has five matches, including first-place UC Davis, which holds a one-game lead on Cal Poly, Long Beach State and Hawai’i, at UC Irvine. Cal Poly plays at Long Beach. 

Lindenwood, the surprise leader in the Ohio Valley Conference, is home for Tennessee State, while second-place Southeast Missouri, two games back in the win column, is home for Eastern Illinois.

League-leading and unbeaten South Dakota State is off The Summit League, but Omaha, a game back, goes to North Dakota.

South Alabama, which tops the Sun Belt, is home for Louisiana. Arkansas State, two games back in the win column, entertains Troy.

Loyola Marymount and Pepperdine are tied for the WCC lead, a game up in the loss column on Washington State. WSU is off, while LMU is at Portland and Pepperdine goes to San Francisco. San Francisco is a game off the lead, tied with San Diego, which goes to Pacific. 

Winless watch: In the only CAA match, 0-22 Hampton plays host to the Fighting Camels of Campbell.

NCAA volleyball Wednesday

Texas A&M (14-4, 5-3) battled to a 25-27, 25-14, 23-25, 25-21, 18-16 at Texas (12-4, 7-1), which still holds a one-game lead in the SEC standings win column over Kentucky, Arkansas and Missouri. The Aggies beat Texas for the first time since 2010 as Logan Lednicky had 23 kills, four digs and four blocks. Emily Hellmuth had 15 kills, nine digs and a solo block, and Ifenna Cos-Okpalla had 10 kills, hit .364, and had seven blocks, one solo. Maddie Waak had 37 assists, three aces and 10 digs. Her team hit .199. Texas, which had won nine in a row, hit .188. Madi Skinner led with 22 kills, hitting .415, and had an ace, two digs and two blocks. Reagan Rutherford had 13 kills, hit .375, and had a dig and four blocks, two solo. Their teammates combined for 28 kills and 17 errors. Texas, in its first year in the SEC, had won 79 conference home matches in Gregory Gym, winning its final 76 home Big 12 matches through 2023, then their first three in the SEC … Also in the SEC, Oklahoma (9-7, 3-5) swept visiting Alabama (10-9, 2-6) and Mississippi State (8-8, 2-5) beat visiting Ole Miss (13-6, 3-4) in four as four Bulldogs had 12 or more kills, 19 by Karli Schmidt … 

There were two matches in the ACC. Sixth-ranked Stanford (15-3, 7-2) hit .352 and won 25-15, 25-17, 25-14 at Cal (10-11, 2-7). Elia Rubin had 11 kills, an assist, eight digs and four blocks, and Ipart Kurt had 10 kills with one error in 16 attacks to hit .563 and had an assist and eight digs. Taylor Yu had five of Stanford’s eight aces. Cal hit .080 … Virginia (16-4, 6-3) won in five at Syracuse (12-9, 0-9), which opened the season with 12 victories and hasn’t won since ACC play began. Virginia, winning at Syracuse for the first time since 1992, has six league wins for the first time since 2015. Lauryn Bowie led with 19 kills, three digs and four blocks, one solo. Elayna Dupery had 14 kills, three aces, four digs and two blocks. Syracuse’s Ava Palm had 20 kills, 13 digs and three blocks, one solo … 

In the Big 12, league-leading No. 9 Kansas (17-1, 8-0) defeated visiting Iowa State (9-9, 3-4) 25-21, 25-15, 23-25, 25-18 as Ayah Elnady had 16 kills, an ace and 18 digs. Caroline Bien had 12 kills with one error in 25 swings to hit .440 and had three assists and 14 digs, and London Davis had 11 kills, hit .333 and had two digs and three blocks. Iowa State’s Faith DeRonde had 12 kills and Amiree Hendricks-Walker had 11, hit .391, and added an assist, two digs and seven blocks, one solo. The Jayhawks built their first-place lead to a full game over idle Arizona State … No. 23 Baylor (12-6, 4-3) won 23-25, 25-16, 25-17, 25-23 at Houston (8-10, 3-5). Elise McGhee had 15 kills, an assist, two aces, eight digs and two blocks … Hailey Green had 21 kills as West Virginia (8-11, 2-6) won 25-20, 23-25, 25-17, 25-17 at Colorado (10-10, 3-5). Green hit .381 … 

Tenth-ranked Purdue (16-4, 7-2) won a hard-fought 28-26, 25-19, 27-25 sweep against visiting Ohio State (8-11, 1-8) in the Big Ten as Eva Hudson had 19 kills, eight digs and four blocks … No. 14 Minnesota (13-6, 6-3) made short work of visiting Northwestern (4-13, 2-7) as Julia Hanson had 19 kills with one error in 34 attacks to hit .529 in the 25-18, 25-19, 25-17 victory. Hanson added four digs and a block. Setter Melani Shaffmaster had two kills, 35 assists, an ace, nine digs and two blocks. Her team hit .351 … 

St. John’s beat visiting Villanova in five in the Big East as Lucrezia Lodi had 24 kills, two aces, six digs and two blocks, one solo. Villanova’s Cat Young had 14 kills, hit .303, and had an assist, nine digs and three blocks, two solo … 

In the sweep by North Florida of the ASUN of the SWAC’s Florida A&M, Anna Butler had 15 kills, hit .429, and had two digs and three blocks … Bryant of the America East improved to 17-6 won at Fairfield of the MAAC in four. London Hunt had 10 kills, hit .400, and had six blocks … In Howard’s 23-25, 8-25, 25-19, 27-25, 15-13 reverse sweep — which certainly seemed unlikely after the second set — of UMBC, the Bison improved to 14-5 behind 18 kills from Rya McKinnon, who had three aces, an assist, 10 digs and four blocks. Howard has won eight in a row. UMBC’s Mia Bilusic had 25 kills, three aces, seven digs and five blocks … LIU of the NEC swept Manhattan of the MAAC and Bella Correia had 11 kills, hit .563, and had four digs and four blocks … East Carolina swept Charlotte in the American Athletic and Fran McBride had 15 kills and hit .362 … Temple of the ACC won in four at Rider of the MAAC as Sydney Jones had 24 kills, an assist, three aces, 11 digs and a block, and Taylor Davenport had 19 kills, hit .457, and had two aces, six digs and three blocks, one solo … 

And San Jose State improved to 11-3, 6-3 in the Mountain West when Utah State forfeited to the Spartans.

Cardona gets MVC honor; AVCA tabs Babcock

No arguing that Olivia Babcock had a great week for No. 1 Pittsburgh in sweeps of Cal and Stanford. She averaged 5.5 kills per set and hit .452 and added 1.83 blocks per set and 1.33 digs.

But Evansville’s Giulia Cardona?

The Missouri Valley Conference player of the week averaged 7.44 kills per set, hitting .321, as Evansville beat Southern Illinois and Missouri State.

Against the Salukis, she had 37 kills, third-highest total in an NCAA match this season and second-highest in a five-set match. Cardona was three off the Missouri Valley Conference single-match record of 40 while hitting .330 to go with 11 digs and two blocks.

Then she had 30 more kills in a four-set win over Missouri State, hitting .310, with 11 digs, three aces and two blocks.

Cardona leads the NCAA in kills (455, 65 ahead of second place) and kills per set (5.55).

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