University of Missouri
Northwestern
Missouri Volleyball Defeats Northwestern in NCAA Tournament
12/6/2002 12:00:00 AM | Volleyball
Dec. 6, 2002
CEDAR FALLS, Iowa. - The University of Missouri volleyball team picked up its first ever NCAA Tournament victory on Friday by defeating Northwestern 3-1 (25-30, 30-21, 31-29, 40-38) in Cedar Falls, Iowa. The Tigers move on the second round where they will take on Northern Iowa.
Northwestern took game one 30-25 with help from MU, which recorded six services errors in the game. The Tigers finished with a season-high 16 services errors in all on the night.
Mizzou rebounded to win games two and three and seemed to have game four won before Northwestern made a late comeback. The Tigers held their first game point at 29-23, but the Wildcats scored the next seven points to take a 30-29 lead. Mizzou had five additional game points before it took the 40-38 win on its 12th match point of the game.
"We're very pleased with how we played tonight," MU coach Susan Kreklow said. "This is a very big win for the University of Missouri. We wanted to not just get to the tournament, but also win at the tournament. We started slow tonight, but were able to settle down and get a good tempo going and then we just played our game."
Mary Lauren Smith had a career night as she led the Tigers with a career-high 28 kills and hit .358. Shen Danru also reached the 20-kill mark, recording a career-high 23 along with 11 digs for her 19th double-double of the season. She also had two services aces, giving her 62 on the season, passing the old record for aces in a season by a Tiger player, which was 61 set by Yvette Buhlig in 1990.
Lindsey Noll added eight kills and Christi Myers had seven. Myers is now just 20 kills away from setting the MU record for most career kills. Lindsey Hunter dished out a career-high 64 assists for the Tigers against Northwestern. Sara Parks led MU in digs with 16, followed by Danru's 11 and Juliana Godoi added 10.
"Lindsey (Hunter) and I were working well tonight and that made it easy to play," Smith said. "We just settled in a played our game. Once we settled down, we were able to play well and keep things going"
Missouri is now 26-7 on the season. The last time a Tiger team had 26 wins in a season came in 1982. The Tigers second round match will take place at 6 p.m. on Saturday.
"We'll celebrate this tonight and try to use the momentum to help us in tomorrow's match," Kreklow said.
