Sept. 26, 2003
WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. - The Purdue volleyball team opened Big Ten play with a 3-0 sweep of the Iowa Hawkeyes Friday night in the Intercollegiate Athletic Facility. A season-high 1523 fans filed in to watch the Boilermakers dominate the Hawkeyes, 30-21, 30-30-23, 30-17 and extend their home win streak to four on the season.
Redshirt sophomore Leah Wischmeier led the Boilermakers with a match-high 15 kills, followed by freshman Melanie Ukovich, who posted 13 kills and a .500 hitting percentage. Sophomore Renata Dargan and freshman Katie Dobson stood as the team's blocking front racking up six blocks each in the match as Purdue out-blocked Iowa 11-4. Junior Daren Poe led the team's defense with 15 digs.
"I think for our team it is a great feeling to get our first Big Ten win because we haven't had many," head coach Dave Shondell said. "I think at one point in game one our team looked across the net and realized that we were better than they are. We competed with great intensity for three games, except for one lapse in game two where we let up a little bit. I asked them to play with great intensity for 90 points and if we did that, I thought that we would succeed. I didn't think that we would win with the scores we had, but we served with precision from start to finish and really disrupted what they were trying to do."
The Boilermakers opened the match with a 7-2 run in game one as four different players registered kills in the opening serves. Iowa cut the lead to two at 7-5, but Purdue boosted the lead to five and then eight at 22-14 forcing Iowa to use its second timeout. Purdue took their largest lead of the game at 29-19, but it took three game point attempts to claim the win. A Hawkeye service error game the Boilermakers the game at 30-21. Purdue hit .333 to Iowa's .095 effort in the game.
The second game saw Purdue take a 6-2 lead early with help from four Hawkeye miscues. Iowa tied it up at seven and even took a brief lead at 8-7 after a pair of Jitka Stehnova service aces. The Boilermakers went up two at 11-9, but the teams battled for the lead over the next several serves. Iowa took a two-point lead at 15-13, but Purdue answered with four straight points including two kills by Dargan and a solo block by McConaha to take a 17-15 advantage. Purdue led from the point on although the Hawkeyes pulled within one at 24-23. Purdue closed the game out with six straight points including two kills by Wischmeier, a block by Dargan and Dobson, and three Iowa errors. Wischmeier tallied six kills in the game on 15 attempts to guide the Purdue offensive attack.
Game three saw the Boilermakers hit .421 and serve up three aces en route to a 30-17 win and their first Big Ten win of the season. Ukovich was solid for the team with seven kills on seven attempts in the game (a 1.000 percentage). Purdue dominated from the get-go, taking an 11-2 advantage including three Wischmeier kills and a McConaha service ace. The Boilermakers upped the lead to 11 at 15-4, but Iowa went on a 5-1 run to cut the margin to seven at 16-9. That was as close as the Hawkeyes would get as the Boilermakers scored five of the last six points to finish the sweep. Kim Cappa had a service ace in the final series. Redshirt freshman Sarah Vitali got in the game to serve up match point, which ended at 30-17 with a block by Dargan and Dobson.
"Everybody played very well," Shondell said. "When things could have stalled a little bit in game three, Leah Wischmeier was good. I challenged Melanie Ukovich after game two and told her that we were not going to win unless she came out and played like she is capable of and she went 7-for-7 with no errors. So, she did a great job out there as well."
The Boilermakers (8-3, 1-0 Big Ten) are back in action at 7 p.m. Saturday against No.18 Minnesota (7-6, 0-1 Big Ten), who fell 3-0 to the Indiana Hoosiers Friday night.