Illinois State Volleyball Splits MVC Opening Weekend, Looks Ahead to Home Opener This Thursday

IMAGE COURTESY OF REDBIRD ATHLETICS

NORMAL, Ill. – Illinois State volleyball (6-8, 1-1) opened Missouri Valley Conference play this weekend splitting a road trip highlighted by the return of Aida Shadewald.

The Redbirds kicked off conference play over the weekend, travelling first to Terra Haute, Indiana to take on the Indiana State Sycamores. The Redbirds finished off the weekend with a trip to Peoria to renew the age-old rivalry between the ISU Redbirds and the Bradley Braves.

ISU came into the weekend back to (almost) full strength with the highly anticipated return of star left side Aida Shadewald. Shadewald had missed the last two out of conference tournaments for the Redbirds after sustaining an ankle injury in Iowa last month. Illinois State Head Coach Allie Matters aimed to rest Aida completely before MVC play started to make sure she came back fully healthy and ready to go and it paid off immediately.

In the first match of the weekend Illinois State chopped down the Indiana State Sycamores sweeping them in three sets, with some nail-biting conclusions. Set one was a relatively simple (25-17) win for the Redbirds, but sets two and three would both go over the typical 25-point scoring limit, (26-24) and (27-25). Set two became the Hannah Reichensperger show, as she closed out the set scoring the winning two points, but the third set was a collective team comeback.

Set three saw the Redbirds come back down eight (21-13) to tie the match at 24 all before Caitlyn Clark (not that one) scored a kill and used the Sycamores momentum against them using an attack error to seal a much-needed win for the Redbirds.

Aida was on somewhat of a snap count in the match. Despite that she still scored five kills and three blocks providing crucial support in the match and her presence was felt the minute she stepped on the court.

The Peoria leg of the trip was a back-and-forth affair for Illinois State, ultimately coming up short in a five-set thriller against eternal rival Bradley on Saturday.

ISU and Bradley traded blows the first four sets with Bradley taking sets one (25-22) and three (25-18), and Illinois State took sets two (25-22) and four (25-21). This was all before Bradley jumped out to a large lead in set five and handed the Redbirds a kick in the gut with a (15-8) set win and took the match (3-2).

Arianna Rossi had a monster game from the Libero position with a career high 39 digs in the match 21 of which came in the first two sets.

Aida Shadewald continued to show she was back to 100 percent with double digit digs in the match herself and picking seven more kills almost reaching another double-double.

Illinois State now sits at (6-8, 1-1) after the weekend and will return to CEFCU arena on Thursday to begin their home MVC schedule hosting the UIC Flames and the Beacons of Valparaiso University.

WZND will be broadcasting Thursday and Friday’s matchups on wznd.com. Both pregame shows will start at 5:50 p.m.

For all things Redbird volleyball, be sure to tune into wznd.com