Northwestern University Athletics
Wildcats On The Road Again
9/30/2003 12:00:00 AM | Women's Volleyball
Sept. 30, 2003
EVANSTON, Ill. - The Wildcats travel to Minnesota and Iowa this weekend for a pair of league matches. The road trip is the first full weekend of the Big Ten season for Northwestern, and they look to bring home a pair of wins to even their conference record at 2-2. Last week the 'Cats dropped matches to Illinois and No. 20 Wisconsin to start the season 0-2. Both Minnesota and Iowa have lost their opening Big Ten games as well.
Standing in the way of their first win is Minnesota, the 2002 Big Ten Volleyball champs. The Golden Gophers, who were ranked No. 20 last week by the AVCA, fell out of the top-25 after dropping matches to Indiana (30-22, 30-25, 34-32) and Purdue (30-25, 25-30, 31-29, 30-24) last weekend. Minnesota (7-7), had a four-game winning streak snapped in the Big Ten opening weekend, with those four wins coming against then-No. 6 Northern Iowa, Colorado State, UNC Charlotte and UW-Milwaukee.
Leading the Golden Gophers last week was Cassie Busse. The senior outside hitter averaged 5.57 kpg, 2.43 dpg and 1.00 bpg in the first weekend of Big Ten play. She tied a career-high with 24 kills against Purdue, along with nine digs and four blocks. Against Indiana she notched 15 kills, eight digs and three blocks in three games. With 39 kills on the weekend, Busse moved to 1,098 career kills which puts her 11th on the Minnesota all-time list.
Iowa also dropped two matches in their first conference weekend, falling to Purdue (30-21, 30-23, 30-17) and Indiana (30-27, 30-19, 30-19). They will play their final nonconference game on Wednesday, Oct. 1 vs. No. 10 Northern Iowa before this weekends league games. The Hawkeyes last wins came against Duke and NC State on Sept. 12 and 13.
Junior outside hitter Laura Simpson led Iowa last weekend, averaging 3.8 kills, 1.3 digs and 0.7 blocks per game. She notched double-figure kills in both matches.
Closer to home, two Northwestern players have been making waves in NCAA Division I stats, with senior Erika Lange (Orland Park, Ill/Carl Sandberg) ranking fourth nationally with her .452 in hitting percentage and Drew Robertson (Long Beach, Calif./Long Beach Poly) ranking eighth among all Division I setters with assists (13.62 apg).
