The time of day may have been unusual, but the results weren’t. Despite an 11:30 a.m. start time at D.J. Sokol Arena, the volleyball side of things was business as usual for No. 17 Creighton on Friday morning. In front of 1,600-plus mostly screaming children, the Bluejays ripped through DePaul in 95 minutes to the tune of a 25-15, 25-17, 25-12 sweep to improve to 20-4 on the season and 11-2 in Big East play ahead of Sunday afternoon’s Top 25 showdown with first place in the conference on the line against the Marquette Golden Eagles.
Senior middle blocker Kiana Schmitt hit an even .500 and finished her afternoon with 10 kills and seven blocks. Junior outside hitter Norah Sis recorded the 33rd double-double of her Bluejay career with a match-best 16 kills to go along with 14 digs and two aces. Sophomore outside hitter Ava Martin rounded out Creighton’s double-digit kill leaders with 11 terminations on .258 hitting. As a team, Creighton finished with a single-digit error count for the fifth time in their last seven matches, outhitting the Blue Demons .322 to .047. The 65 digs were the most by the Jays in a 3-set match since their win at Purdue during the first weekend of the season.
“Statistically things looked good,” Creighton head coach Kirsten Bernthal Booth said. “I thought our serving kind of let down in game two, and at points we gave up some points, but I thought we responded each time and were in control throughout the match. We passed really well, and then in set three I thought we coupled it with serving really well and that led to a lot of good things.”
The first 25 rallies of both sets one and two were tightly contested, but Creighton took over at the midway mark of each game to win them both in lopsided fashion to take a 2-0 match lead at the break. The Bluejays hold a 14-12 lead in set one before winning 11 of the last 14 rallies and closing the set on a 7-0 run. In game two, CU trailed 12-11 before rattling off five straight points to take control of the set. Over the last 15 rallies of the first set and the last 17 of the second, the Jays combined for 15 kills on 30 swings and outhit the Blue Demons .467 to -.065.
Creighton came out of the locker room no less in rhythm than they were going in, getting kills by Sis and freshman outside hitter Destiny Ndam-Simpson to spark a 4-0 start to the third set and never look back. They tallied 13 kills and no errors on 27 swings for a .481 attack percentage — their most efficient set of the of match — in the third game to finish off their eighth consecutive sweep since a 3-0 loss to Marquette back on October 6 in Milwaukee. Not only have the Bluejays not dropped a set in almost a month, but they’ve allowed their opponent to hit the 20-point mark in only seven of those 24 sets.
“We’ve been focusing on a lot of the little things,” Schmitt said. “We’re getting more block touches and getting low in coverage. Just doing a lot of the little things that were costing us points here and there. I think we’ve picked it up and that has helped us.”
It’s also no coincidence that Creighton’s been on fire since Norah Sis returned to action after a five-week absence. The Jays have won all seven matches and all 21 sets since she stepped back on the court. She did not play against Marquette the first time. She’ll get her chance at helping Creighton settle that score starting at 1:00 p.m. on Sunday afternoon. The Golden Eagles are currently one game up on the Jays in the Big East standings, but despite impact that match will have on not only the regular season title race, seeding for the Big East Tournament, and Creighton’s potential bid to host a regional for the third consecutive season, the mindset going in is to stick with what got them in this position in the first place.
“Something important is to not make [the match] bigger than it is,” Sis said. “It’s just another game. It’s obviously a game that we look forward to every year, but if we stay consistent with playing our game, playing to our level, and not thinking we have to do so much more to beat Marquette then I think we’ll have a lot of success.”