Rosen Earns First Win as #12 Volleyball Outlasts #14 Jayhawks

MADISON, Wis. — The No. 12 Creighton Volleyball workforce earned its first win beneath Brian Rosen because the Bluejays defeated No. 14 Kansas in 5 units on Sunday afternoon on the Opening Spike Classic in Madison, Wis. The Bluejays fell behind 3-0 to begin the fifth set earlier than a 9-0 run helped Creighton to the victory.

Scores of the match in favor of CU have been 25-17, 25-21, 21-25, 25-27, 15-12. Creighton is now 1-2 whereas Kansas is 1-3.

The first set featured six ties and was knotted at 7-7 earlier than a 4-0 serving run by Ava Martin preceded a Kansas timeout. Martin then authored back-to-back aces out of the break earlier than a Kiara Reinhardt kill helped the Jays double up KU, 14-7, and CU wouldn’t path once more en path to a 25-17 victory. Martin had 4 kills, three digs and a pair of aces whereas Eloise Brandewie had a hand in half of CU’s 4 blocks. Creighton hit .219 within the opener and held KU to .057 hitting.

A 5-1 run halfway via the second set helped Creighton transfer forward 12-9. Once the Jayhawks closed inside 16-15, Kiara Reinhardt put down consecutive kills as CU’s lead returned to 3 at 18-15. Thanks largely to 5 kills from Reinhardt, the Bluejays took a 2-0 lead into intermission with a 25-21 win. Brandewie added three extra blocks and Saige Damrow contributed 5 of CU’s 16 digs to assist restrict the Jayhawks to .118 hitting.

Creighton gained some momentum within the third set with a 5-0 run on Damrow’s serve to maneuver in entrance 11-10, a surge that was led by a pair of Destiny Ndam-Simpson blocks of 6-foot-7Jovana Zelenovic. Kansas broke free from a 19-19 tie with a 4-0 service run by Cristin Cline, then gained it 25-21 on a Zelenovic kill. Martin topped CU with 4 kills within the third set. Rhian Swanson got here off the bench to steer KU with 4 kills within the body.

Kansas used one other run on Cline’s serve within the fourth set, scoring seven consecutive factors to take a 12-8 lead earlier than the Jays countered with six of the following eight factors to tie the rating at 14-14. The rating remained tight after a giant again row swing from Martin made it 19-19, the tenth tie of the set. Another Brandewie/Ndam-Simpson stuff of Zelenovic tied the rating at 21 and Brandewie and Annalea Maeder adopted with one other block (of Selena Leban) to place CU three factors from victory at 22-21. Ndam-Simpson painted the road to present CU a 23-22 lead, however Kansas scored the following two factors to get a set level at 24-23. CU stayed alive after a KU assault error and a Martin kill gave CU a match level at 25-24, solely to have KU keep alive on a kill by Reese Ptacek for the seventeenth tie of the set. KU earned itself one other set level after a block by Ptacek and Cline, and gained the fourth on an ace by Leban. Kansas outblocked CU 4-2 within the fourth set, limiting the Bluejay assault to .087 hitting.

Kansas scored the primary three factors of the fifth set on Grace Nelson’s serve, however the Bluejays scored 9 in a row on Sydney Breissinger’s serve in a spurt that included two kills and a block by Brandewie and was capped by an ace. Kansas obtained inside 10-7 earlier than a Brandewie’s ninth kill, and at 11-8 Reinhardt had a solo stuff to place CU up 4 factors. Reinhardt’s eleventh kill put the Jays up 13-9 and a Ndam-Simpson kill made it 14-11. CU clinched it on a kill by Ndam-Simpson.

Martin led Creighton with 18 kills, including 9 digs and two aces. Ndam-Simpson had 13 kills and eight digs, whereas Reinhardt picked up 11 kills on .364 hitting. Brandewie hit .350 and had 9 kills and 9 blocks. Creighton completed with 64 kills, 74 digs, 13 blocks and 5 aces whereas hitting .204.

Kansas completed with 50 kills, 59 digs, eight blocks and 4 aces and hit .137. Zelenovic had 16 kills and Leban added 10 for the Jayhawks.

Creighton will play three matches subsequent weekend on the Trojan Invitational in Los Angeles, beginning with Friday’s 6 p.m. Central contest towards San Diego.

NOTES: Creighton tied a school-record by enjoying its fifth consecutive match towards a ranked workforce relationship to final fall …  The attendance of 11,678 is the biggest crowd Creighton has ever performed in entrance of for a neutral-site match … Ava Martin had her eightieth straight match with 5 or extra kills … Kiara Reinhardt’s 11 kills have been her most since Oct. 7, 2022 … Saige Damrow joined Brittany Witt and Nayka Benitez as the one ladies to begin their Creighton profession with three straight matches of 14 digs or extra … Each of Kansas’ first three matches (towards Vanderbilt, No. 2 Pen State and No. 8 Wisconsin) had additionally gone 5 units … Eloise Brandewie had a career-high 9 blocks … Creighton has now crushed at the least one Top 25 workforce every of the final 11 seasons …  Creighton is now 5-9 all-time towards the Jayhawks however has gained 4 of the previous 5 conferences … Today was the fourth time that Creighton has crushed a ranked Kansas workforce, which trails solely Creighton’s 9 victories over ranked Marquette groups and 5 triumphs over ranked Kentucky squads  … Creighton prevented its first 0-3 begin since 2002 … Brian Rosen is Creighton’s first head coach to earn his/her first win on the Bluejay sideline over a ranked workforce since Johnny Torres led the CU males’s soccer workforce to a win over No. 21 Akron in 2019 … Creighton is 21-4 in its final 25 impartial web site matches … Creighton has gained 107 straight matches when taking a 2-0 lead into intermission … Creighton snapped a five-match shedding streak in five-set matches with its first such triumph since Sept. 16, 2023 at No. 9 Minnesota. Breissinger served a 9-0 run within the fifth set of that victory.