Indiana University Athletics
INDIANA DEFEATS NO. 16 CLEMSON IN FIRST ROUND NCAA PLAY
12/2/1999 12:00:00 AM | Women's Volleyball
INDIANA DEFEATS NO. 16 CLEMSON IN FIRST ROUND NCAA PLAY
CLEMSON, South Carolina - Indiana University's volleyball team upset No.16 Clemson University 15-9, 11-15, 15-5, 15-12 Thursday evening in the first round of NCAA tournament play at Littlejohn Coliseum. Clemson finishes the season 31-3.
With the victory the Hoosiers (20-10) advance for the second-straight year to second round action of postseason tournament play against No.17 Northern Iowa (29-0) who defeated Ball State (28-7) 12-15, 15-9, 10-15, 15-2, 15-12 in the first match of the evening. The winner of Friday's 7 p.m., match will advance to the Sweet Sixteen Dec. 9-12.
"That (Clemson) was a great team we just beat," said Katie Weismiller. "We've watched a lot of film on them and knew this would be a fight. Indiana came out aggressive tonight and when we play like that, good things happen."
The Hoosiers came out aggressive in game one, chasing down every Tiger attack while running their own offense on high throttle. IU jumped out to a 6-2 lead and never looked back, outscoring Clemson 9-3 down the stretch to win the game.
Indiana cooled down in game two, falling behind 6-10. After Hoosier timeout, IU returned to the court to outscore Clemson 5-1 to tie the game at 11 all. But then it was Clemson's turn for a timeout where the timeout regrouped to score the next four points and take the 15-11 win.
Indiana tallied a .314 attack percentage with just five hitting errors in game three as the Hoosiers won handily 15-5.
Game four was a dogfight from the start with neither team leading by more than two until Clemson was able to break a nine all tie and was able to roll off three-straight points to go up 12-9. The Hoosiers called timeout and came back to score the next six straight points to win the game and match 15-12.
Three Hoosiers tallied double figure kill totals, led by junior Amanda Welter's 25 kills. Teammates Hillary Toivonen and Jill Mudge added 16 and 13 kills, respectively. Welter also led IU with an impressive .525 attack percentage, recording just four errors in the match. As a team, Indiana outplayed the Tigers in every statistical category, totaling more kills, digs, blocks and service aces.
"I am certain that Northern Iowa is ready to play Indiana," said Weismiller. "We ended their season last year in the tournament and I'm sure they are ready for payback. But from our point of view, we are taking this just one game at a time."
The Hoosiers will play Northern Iowa in the second round on Friday, December
3 at 7 p.m. in Clemson.
