Volleyball sweeps UW-Milwaukee in three sets

By Mike Romor

NIU women’s volleyball intended on extending its four match winning streak Tuesday night when it traveled to UW-Milwaukee.

The Huskies (7-2) defeated the Panthers (5-2) in three grueling sets, 27-25, 29-27, 26-24.

Senior Allison McGlaughlin led the Huskies with a .343 hitting percentage on 17 kills. McGlaughin also added seven digs and an ace.

Sophomore Lauren Wicinski recorded a double-double and led the Huskies in kills. Wicinski had 23 kills, 13 digs and four aces while posting her eighth double-double in nine matches this season.

“Lauren and Allison both had big nights for us on the attack,” said NIU head coach Ray Gooden. “They both had some critical points for us when we needed them. I thought we did a good job playing defense toward the end [of the match].”

NIU held Milwaukee to just 12 kills and a .200 hitting percentage in the third set.

As a team, NIU was out hit by Milwaukee by a sliver, .260 to .262. NIU also had 21 attack errors to the Panthers’ 14, but great defense and dominating serving sealed the victory.

The Huskies held Milwaukee to 42 assists, while senior Kristin Hoffman tallied 52 of NIU’s 55 assists on the evening.

Sophomore Amber Walker paced NIU’s defense with 21 digs and the Huskies delivered six aces to Milwaukee’s one.

In a match with 39 tie scores and 12 lead changes, NIU found a way to ride the storm.

“I think we capitalized really well with our serves,” said sophomore Sarah Angelos, who had nine kills on the night. “We were down a few times in the match where we’d come back with a couple serving runs and some good blocking. At the times we needed it, we made great plays.”

NIU just came off of a 3-0 weekend at Creighton’s Bluejay Invitational and was able to grab through its fifth straight road match. With three road matches ahead, NIU looks forward to getting through the early season stretch and returning home.

“We’ve got to work really hard just to get ourselves through the week,” Gooden said. “It’s a lot of stress for us. We’re playing really good teams that are all a challenge, so we are going to try and continue to get through this grind.”