Most programs across the country — in every sport — would see a tournament like the Cardinal Classic and immediately get wide-eyed about the opportunity to take on a top five program. Kirsten Bernthal Booth takes a different approach. She makes sure that her players understand that if they want to be among the 16 teams that get to sleep in their own beds during the first weekend of the NCAA Tournament that losses against teams in the 40-60 range of the RPI hurt more than it helps to beat teams in the Top 10.
In that regard, Creighton has handled its business in Louisville this weekend. After sweeping Northern Iowa in a choppy performance on Friday, the Jays were much more clean, consistent, and dominant for larger stretches on Saturday afternoon in doing the same to Rice in a 25-16, 25-21, 25-12 sweep.
Six-rotation outside hitters Norah Sis and Ava Martin each had a match-high 14 kills for the Bluejays, who improved to 7-1 on the season with the win. No one else for either the Jays or Owls finished with more than seven. Martin hit .448 on 29 swings and added in seven digs to her day, while Sis chipped in 12 digs, five aces, and three blocks to round out her performance.
Kendra Wait finished with 35 assists and nine digs. Middle blocker Kiara Reinhardt had eight blocks and three kills, while libero Maddy Bilinovic led the way with a match-high 13 digs.
Bilinovic also added a pair of aces for good measure to help Creighton hold Rice to a season-low .060 attack percentage. The Bluejays outscored the Owls 11-5 when the Penn State transfer was behind the line on Saturday.
“Maddy’s got good tempo pretty consistently on her serve,” head coach Kirsten Bernthal Booth said. “I think sometimes what we see is some players have tempo sometimes, and then other times they might get a little bit nervous and that tempo changes. Maddy is someone that I think feels pretty confident to go back and hit it no matter the situation.”
Bilinovic’s serving in the first set keyed a 6-0 run that allowed CU to turn a 5-2 deficit into an 8-5 lead. They also got sharper offensively as game one wore on, pushing the lead to as much as seven before outscoring Rice 5-2 at end game to put away a 25-16 opening-set victory.
After hitting .211 on the first 25 rallies, the Jays eluded opposing blockers more consistently and closed the set with 6 kills on their final 10 swings.
“Sometimes there is an acclimation period to get used to what a blocker is doing and things along those lines,” Booth said. “Sometimes it’s frustrating because we’re saying, ‘hey, we told you in scout that these things happen,’ and we’d like them to make that connection a little bit faster sometimes. But I do think just as you can watch it on film, getting out there and seeing the size and seeing what they’re doing with their hands, there is something to be said that after you see it a couple times you can make some adjustments.”
The second set was all about Ava Martin. The third-year, six-rotation hitter cut hole after hole in Rice’s defense with five kills on the first six rallies to carry Creighton to a 5-1 lead out of the gate.
“She was really good all day,” Booth said. “She hit almost .500 today and carried a ton of load. And that’s good because we need Ava in Ava form over the next couple weeks for sure.”
After hitting just .194 against UNI on Friday, Martin asked Creighton’s long-time shot doctor, assistant coach Angie Oxley Behrens, for one thing to focus on against the Owls. Behrens’ response was centered around being “slow to fast.”
Martin applied the advice to an impressive degree. Of the 12 swings she took in set two, she put the ball down on nine of them without committing an error for an astronomically high .750 attack percentage. Only one of her 29 total attacks against the Owls resulted in an error.
“I was just mixing up my shots,” Martin said. “Yesterday, I was kind of hitting the same spot, so just working slow to fast on my approach and mixing it up.”
Everyone not named Ava had to overcome some error-prone moments that fueled a 7-0 run for Rice after their junior pin hitter’s hot start to the set. They eventually settled back down to re-seize control and Martin appropriately put it away with another kill on set point for the 25-21 win.
As was the case on the five previous occasions this season, the Bluejays didn’t play with their food after grabbing a 2-0 lead. Rice won four of the first six rallies after intermission, but the rest of the third set belonged to Creighton. A kill by Norah Sis gave CU a 14-8 lead midway through, then a 7-0 serving run by the senior — that included three of her career-high five aces — extended the lead to 21-8, effectively putting the match on ice.
Now comes the fun part, as Kirsten Bernthal Booth said afterwards. The much-anticipated rematch with No. 4 Louisville — the team that ended Creighton’s season nine months ago in a Sweet 16 five-setter.
“We’re all super excited, obviously,” Ava Martin said. “Even thinking about that loss last year still hurts, so I think we’re all coming out to dominate and do really well. We want to come out strong and take control, and honestly, just have fun. It’s a great environment, it’s a great rematch, and it’s a chance to prove to ourselves that we belong to be in the Top 10 and that we can make it to the Final Four.”
The Cardinals owned the opening set of that NCAA Tournament matchup last December, outhitting the Jays .400 to .222. What could have been had Creighton paired a stronger start with their eventual dominant 25-14 win in the second set that day or the third and fourth sets in their five-set loss in Lincoln on Tuesday?
Kirsten Bernthal Booth tasked her team with finding out on Sunday.
“I challenged them because sometimes we work into matches,” she said. “I’d really like to see us come out strong tomorrow from the get-go; taking more risks and not playing conservatively to start. Sometimes we work our way into that aggressiveness, and we just can’t do that against a team like Louisville.”
First serve on ESPN between the ninth-ranked Bluejays and fourth-ranked Cardinals is set for 12:00 p.m. (CT) tomorrow.