Idaho volleyball swept by Northern Arizona in opening round of Big Sky Tournament
Idaho swept Northern Arizona Oct. 2 in Memorial Gym. However, the Lumberjacks turned the tables on the Vandals Thursday in Pocatello as No. 5 seed Northern Arizona beat No. 4 seed Idaho 3-0 in the opening round of the Big Sky Tournament ending Idaho’s season.
“Obviously, tonight we didn’t show the type of volleyball that we can play, which is unfortunate,” Idaho coach Debbie Buchanan said. “Part of it due to the injury (to Meredith Coba), part of it just due to not executing the game and sticking to the game plan.”
Northern Arizona was in control most of the match. The Lumberjacks were either tied with the Vandals or led in the entirety of the first and third sets. Northern Arizona won those sets 25-16. The Lumberjacks won the second set 25-20 in a battle that had seven ties and three lead changes.
“NAU came out and I thought they played solid,” Buchanan said. “We just didn’t execute our game plan.”
Senior middle blocker Stephanie Hagins and junior outside hitter Katelyn Peterson paced the Vandals with nine kills apiece. The two also had the highest hitting percentages on the team as Hagins hit .273 and Peterson hit .219.
Idaho played the match without Coba, a junior setter. Coba suffered a season-ending leg injury against North Dakota Nov. 13. Freshman setter Sami Parris, a Pocatello native, and sophomore setter Michele Brown stepped in for the injured Coba. Parris and Brown played all three sets with Parris totaling 14 assists and Brown 15 assists.
Buchanan said Idaho made too many errors in the match.
“It’s not due to the setter change, even though that’s probably what has caused some of the disruption obviously,” Buchanan said. “But everyone had their share amount of errors … Game one we were at 14 errors to their three. We’re not going to beat anybody when we make that many errors and so we got it down a little bit as the match went on, but we just really couldn’t find a rhythm tonight.”
In the first set, Idaho trailed 13-12, but the Lumberjacks proceeded to go on a 6-0 run to extend their lead to 19-12. Idaho climbed back with three straight points before NAU closed out the match with a 6-1 run.
Idaho led 10-9 in the second set and the Vandals only trailed 20-18 later on in the set, but Northern Arizona was able to close the set out 25-20.
After a 5-5 tie in the third set, Northern Arizona separated itself from the Vandals by taking a 10-5 lead. The Lumberjacks extended the lead to 19-9 and maintained a big lead to win 25-16.
Defense seemed to be a key to Northern Arizona’s win as it had 10 total team blocks to Idaho’s six and 67 digs to Idaho’s 48.
Although Idaho lost its first-round match, four Vandals earned Big Sky Conference honors before the tournament started.
Coba and senior middle blocker Alyssa Schultz earned first-team all-conference selections. Sophomore outside hitter Ali Forde earned second-team all-conference and Hagins won Top Newcomer.
In other tournament action Thursday, second-seeded North Dakota beat No. 7 Montana, No. 3 Northern Colorado defeated No. 6 Portland State and top-seeded tournament host Idaho State beat No. 8 Southern Utah. All three matches were sweeps.
North Dakota faces Northern Colorado and Idaho State plays Northern Arizona Friday. The winners of those matches will play each other Saturday for the Big Sky Championship.
Garrett Cabeza can be reached at [email protected]