Redbirds take down Valparaiso Three sets to One

Image courtesy of goredbirds.com

NORMAL Ill.- The Illinois State Redbirds Volleyball team beat Valparaiso 3 sets to 1. Taking sets 1, 3, and 4. Led by Kaylee Martin with eighteen kills. Stef Jankiewicz led the team with forty-eight assists. The team received a spark with the return of Sydney Holt back after missing over a month from an injury. In her return, holt recorded eleven kills, an assist and 2 blocks.

“I think it was really exciting. Sydney is a really big spark for us. She hits the ball so hard and it gives us so much momentum so we’re all really excited to have her back.” Said Kaylee Martin, an outside hitter for Illinois State.

The redbirds dominated set 1 by a score of twenty five to twelve. Everything was going right for the redbirds in set one playing well on the offensive attack. The redbirds gave Valparaiso a few easy points with 3 serving errors in the first set alone.

Valparaiso gave the redbirds much more of a challenge in the second half. Playing much sloppier the redbirds recorded a whopping 9 errors, gifting Valparaiso points. On the other end Valparaiso did not gift free points to the redbirds with as many errors, ending in a set win for Valparaiso.

Not letting the second set loss faze them, the redbirds came back out and dominated set 3. Playing well, not making mistakes and playing clean volleyball. Ultimately the redbirds went out and took care of Valparaiso, winning set 3 by a score of twenty five to twelve and hitting almost 28% of their attacks.

In the final set, Valparaiso played the Redbirds much closer. Playing much sloppier the redbirds defense was letting them down, making mental mistakes. The redbirds were trailing twenty to eighteen, before going on a 7 to 1 scoring run to take set 4 by a score of twenty five to twenty one.

The redbirds will take on Valparaiso again tomorrow at 4. We will have live coverage of the game here on our website and on 103.3 WZND.