The No. 5 Badgers (1-1 Big Ten, 10-2 overall) halted their losing streak at two by sweeping Ohio State (0-2, 9-5) 25-19, 25-19, 25-17 at the UW Field House Sunday. Wisconsin looked dominant on both the offensive and defensive end as Ohio State looked outmatched the entire game.
The first set started out tightly contested as the two teams’ went point for point before Wisconsin started to pull away with senior outside hitter Courtney Thomas serving.
Thomas helped the Badgers extend their lead to 6-3 before Ohio State got the serve back. Wisconsin continued to slowly pull away as they went on a 6-2 run to build their lead up to 19-13. The Buckeyes stormed back to pull the game within four at 23-19 but the Badgers would not be denied and won the set 25-19.
Not letting Ohio State go on runs was definitely a point of emphasis for head coach Kelly Sheffield and the rest of his staff.
“I thought we did a really good job of not letting them get on runs,” Sheffield said. “I thought we did a really good job of communicating. I thought we did a really good job of helping each other out when a lot of the subbing was going on. It was a good team win for us.”
The second set featured more of the same style of play, as Wisconsin continued to impose their will on the Buckeyes. Wisconsin held Ohio State to a .128 attacking percentage while the Badgers had a .306 percentage of their own.
Redshirt senior middleback Dominique Thompson lead all Badgers in the set registering five kills. Attacking the middle of the court was extremely effective for the Badger offense.
“Our middles did a really good job today of transitioning and getting up and that made my life super easy,” sophomore setter Lauren Carlini said.
All of this added up to a 25-19 set win for the Badgers. Wisconsin knew they had to take advantage of this opportunity to close out the game in the third set.
“I think we just have a lot of fighting spirit right now and when we have a team down 2-0 going into the third game we’re not going to let them come back,” Thomas said.
The Badgers did just that coming out on fire in the third set. Wisconsin started the set out on a 13-2 run, which featured seven kills and one ace.
Ohio State tried to make it a game by going on a run of their own to pull the set to within five at 23-17. However, the Badgers didn’t let them come back and eventually won the set 25-17.
Overall, the players were extremely happy to get in the win column for Big Ten play in front of their home crowd following their loss to No. 3 Penn State (14-1, 2-0) earlier in the week.
“Our fans know what we went through last game against Penn State and knew how much of a struggle it was after the game.” Carlini said. “We were all mad about it… but we came back fiery and we wanted to win this game for our fans and for our team.”
As is normal life in Big Ten volleyball, the Badgers have two road tests coming up as they travel to Northwestern (12-1, 2-0) Wednesday followed by another road game at Illinois (10-3, 2-0).
