The No. 18 Wisconsin volleyball team (0-2 Big Ten, 10-4 overall) started off on the wrong foot to start this year's conference season, as they were upset in a 25-23, 25-19, 25-10 sweep by Iowa (1-0 Big Ten, 9-4 overall) and suffered a 25-23, 10-25, 24-26, 20-25 defeat to No. 12 Minnesota (2-0 Big Ten, 12-2 overall) the following night.
With their first conference win Friday night, the Hawkeyes matched the number of conference wins they had during the 2007 season and defeated the Badgers for the first time in 13 years.
The bout with Iowa was Wisconsin's worst performance of the season to date. The team was held to 32 kills and .100 hitting as a team with 4.5 blocks and, for the first time this year, no service aces.
On the other side of the net, Iowa put up better numbers in nearly every statistical category, including nine service aces in the three sets played. Wisconsin did get a nine kill, .353 hitting performance from junior opposite hitter Katherine Dykstra, but Iowa's senior outside hitter Catherine Smale led all players with 12 kills on the night.
Set one started off poorly for the Badgers, who trailed 7-1 early on and struggled to catch up. Iowa would never relinquish the lead in the first, despite a late surge by Wisconsin to pull within one at 23-22. The second set was closer, with teams knotted up at 10-10 early on, but a string of unforced errors gave Iowa a 14-10 lead that Wisconsin could not catch up with again.
The final set ended in a similar fashion, with an early 4-4 tie that was broken by seven consecutive Hawkeye points to make the score 11-4, and again, the Badgers could not make a comeback.
Saturday's match in Minneapolis showed more tenacity on Wisconsin's part, but it was not enough to pull off the win. Though the Badgers were once again outperformed in nearly every facet, they did accumulate 49 kills, nine blocks, 72 digs, and a service ace to improve from the previous night. Junior outside hitter Caity DuPont earned her first double-double of her career, scoring a team high 14 kills and racking up 11 digs.
But it was Minnesota's sophomore middle blocker Lauren Gibbemeyer who stole the show, leading all players with 10 blocks and throwing down 16 kills for a .364 hitting percentage.
To start the night, Wisconsin kept the first set close, tying the Golden Gophers at 14, 15, 20, 21, 22 and 23 before being finished off with two straight kills. After a second set that was all Minnesota, Wisconsin came out strong in the third, taking a 6-3 lead before the Gophers came back to reclaim it at 18-14 and held on to win despite a strong comeback by the Badgers.
A tight fourth set was eventually broken open by the Gophers as well, as the Badgers fell behind 18-15 late and stayed behind for the remainder of the round.
We're just looking at really improving every time we get on the court and this was much better than last night,"" head coach Pete Waite said. ""We like what we saw, we changed the lineup a little bit, DuPont was playing back row a lot and that was great. She was passing well and scoring well for us. I think they just have to keep gaining confidence, keep improving and we go at it at home next time and get the win.""
The Badgers will return home for the first time since Sept. 14 to host their Big Ten home opener against Michigan on Friday and against Ohio State on Sunday.
- uwbadgers.com contributed to this report.
