The Northwestern volleyball team is searching for consistency, but it would just as soon settle for a win. It found neither in the Great Lake State last weekend, falling to Michigan and Michigan State. NU’s losing streak now has reached eight straight matches.
The Wildcats (8-15, 4-12 Big Ten) beat both teams early in the season at home, but they had no such luck on the road. Friday’s match against Michigan State was close, highlighted by a breakout performance from middle blocker Erika Lange. Michigan “put a clamp on us” on Saturday night, according to NU coach Keylor Chan.
Chan said that the home-court advantage was part of the reason why his team could not repeat their only weekend sweep of the season. But the maturity of the NU program is the biggest factor in its inability to get wins.
“We’re trying to get away from saying that we’re a young program because the girls are getting tired of hearing it,” Chan said. “But what it comes down to is that we are young. (Our program) is light-years ahead of where it was last year. We are continuing to narrow the gap, but it’s frustrating because we’re not getting the results.”
As for this weekend in particular, Chan said Michigan and Michigan State were “flat out better than us,” largely because their programs have worked on “fine tuning” since the first time the teams met, while the Cats are still laying the foundation of their program.
“You can only learn so much at a time,” Chan said. “It’s like cramming for a test. We’ve grown so much this season, and after a while it’s tiring and you just need time to recover before you can grow more.”
Michigan State (16-6, 9-6) defeated NU in four games on Friday night. The Cats kept the first two games close and won the third, but the Spartans regained control and won the fourth to close the match (30-26, 30-21, 26-30, 30-20). NU was relieved to have Lange back on her game because of her three-week slump. Lange, who was benched for most of the Cats’ last match against Illinois, neared perfection with 12 kills and no hitting errors to go along with her eight blocks.
Lange, along with junior middle blocker Sarah Ballog, has anchored NU’s block – the team’s main strength this season – and Friday was no exception. The Cats outblocked Michigan State 11-7. Although the Cats are third in the Big Ten in blocking, they worry that relying too heavily on its strength at the net can be a problem.
“We blocked well on Friday, ” coach Keylor Chan said. “But you can’t rely on just that one skill to win games. When ball control goes out the window, you’re going to struggle in this conference.”
Ball control has been an issue for the Cats all season – it tends to be the first thing that goes when the team gets frustrated, Chan said. On Friday night, it was the key to keeping the match close.
“Our passing was pretty consistent (on Friday),” Lange said. “There were runs where it was shaky, but there were runs where it was perfect. And that’s the key to good offense.”
Chan was pleased with the Cats’ overall performance on Friday, which he called “very competitive.” Saturday night, on the other hand, was not competitive, as NU came out listless and was no match for Michigan (12-11, 8-8). The Wolverines snapped their three-match losing streak in three quick games (30-17, 30-20, 30-21).
“They played really well,” Chan said of Michigan. “They came out focused and ready to take it to us.”
The Wolverines held NU to a meager .055 hitting percentage, all but shutting down the Cats’ offense. No NU player had more than six kills in the match. This weekend’s losses put NU in eighth place in the Big Ten, essentially knocking it out of contention for the NCAA tournament. Generally, the NCAA only extends bids only to teams finishing in the top half of the Big Ten.
