MILWAUKEE — On their first venture outside of the UW Field House this season, the No. 11 Wisconsin volleyball team (6-1) stormed into Milwaukee and swept the competition out of the building in the 2006 Pepsi Panther Invitational Tournament hosted by UW-Milwaukee. The Badgers downed Northern Colorado (3-6), the University of Windsor and UW-Milwaukee (7-3) while collecting a handful of tournament honors en route to their sixth victory in as many matches.
Wisconsin earned its first victory of the weekend on Friday night against Northern Colorado, beating them 30-22, 30-13, 30-24. The Badgers crushed the Bears' offense all night, holding them to a meager .067 team hitting percentage. Northern Colorado setter Kriste Schevikhoven, who has averaged a .246 hitting percentage so far this season, was held to four kills on 13 attempts with two errors. On the other side of the net, senior middle blocker Amy Bladow dominated the court, racking up a .600 hitting percentage and four blocking assists.
Saturday morning, the Badgers played in an exhibition match against the Windsor Lancers from Ontario, Canada. Since NCAA rules prevent matches against Canadian schools from counting towards a school's record, Wisconsin had an opportunity to change its starting lineup without fearing consequence. But UW had nothing to fear, as the bench took care of business and beat the Lancers 30-11, 30-17, 30-20. Sophomore outside hitter Morgan Salow had 10 kills on 15 attempts with no errors while freshman middle blcoker Katherine Dykstra put up a team-high 12.5 points.
""It was an opportunity for a lot of players that haven't been on the court much to get out there and play and show us what they've got in a competition,"" Wisconsin head coach Pete Waite said. ""It was fun for them and fun for the people that were normally on the court to be on the sideline cheering and pushing for them because they work so hard every day in practice.""
In the tournament championship, Wisconsin faced off against in-state rival UW-Milwaukee and took them out 30-22, 30-25, 30-23. The Panthers did not go down easily, however, as middle blocker Cheryl Hegemann still managed to put up 10 points and eight digs while outside hitter Melissa David pulled off a .333 hitting percentage. But the Badgers outplayed UW-Milwaukee, hitting .308 as a team and coming up with 45 digs, compared to the Panthers' .111 percentage and 41 digs.
""I think [UW-Milwaukee] has a really balanced attack ... and they were setting all of their hitters across the front row, so it really kept us on our toes blocking,"" Bladow said. ""In the third game we came out, we were more aggressive passing, and that really helps.""
""I was pretty nervous about this match,"" Waite said. ""This is the kind of match where they can really play well and cause us some problems because of the different styles of the two teams. Obviously, we're going to have the bigger block, and I think that made the difference today.""
In addition to taking home a first place finish, freshman outside hitter Brittney Dolgner, junior setter Jackie Simpson and Bladow were named to the All-Tournament team. Fresh off the 10 kill, eight block performance against UW-Milwaukee, Bladow was also honored with the title of tournament MVP.
Next up for Wisconsin is another road tournament, this time for the San Diego Invitational Sept. 15-16. The Badgers will spend the week preparing to take on UC -Santa Barbara, Brown University and UC-San Diego.
