LOUISVILLE, Ky. – The UNI volleyball team rolled in the first two sets and finished strong in the fourth frame on Friday as the Panthers advanced to the second round of the NCAA Tournament on Friday with a 3-1 win over the Illinois Fighting Illini at the KFC Yum! Center.
Using strong backrow defense and an impressive offensive performance off the Illini block, the Panthers grabbed a 2-0 match lead on Illinois before dropping the third set and holding off the Illini late in the fourth to grab its first NCAA Tournament victory since 2022.
UNI opened their 26th NCAA Tournament appearance with an impressive first set, forcing the Illini into five attack errors and holding Illinois to a .188 hitting clip. After an early 2-2 tie, the Panthers grabbed the lead and never looked back, ripping off a 15-7 scoring run thanks to five kills each from Cassidy Hartman and OIlivia Tjernagel to boost a .467 hitting clip for the Panthers. Kacie Rewerts added three blocks in the opening frame, along with a pair of aces from Grace Mikota and Erin Powers to win the first set, 25-16.
The Illini gave Northern Iowa an early run in the second stanza before pulling away from an 8-8 tie. Paced by six second set kills by Hartman and four by Kira Fallert, UNI notched a .243 hitting percentage with 14 kills to build another healthy lead. With Illinois continuing to struggle with nine attack errors and a hitting clip of .000, Rewerts added two more blocks to her ledger as the Panthers took the second frame by a 25-16 score and a 2-0 match lead.
Illinois defense shut down the UNI offense in the third set, holding the Panthers to nine kills with six attack errors and a .094 hitting clip. The Illini’s blocking defense registered four total blocks while its offense notched 18 kills on .471 hitting despite UNI’s attempts of a comeback. Tjernagel led Northern Iowa with three terminations in the third set, with Hartman and Lily Dykstra each registering two kills, while Powers added another ace in a 25-16 loss.
The fourth set saw the Panthers grab an early 7-4 lead and establish early momentum with Powers adding her fourth ace of the match and Booth her first in her NCAA Tournament debut. While UNI hit .378 in the frame, the Illini cut Northern Iowa’s 18-11 lead down to three at 20-17 before the Panthers closed the match with three kills from Tjernagel for a 25-21 win.
Hartman finished the night with a match-high 21 kills, while Tjernagel tallied 13 kills and four blocks. Fallert recorded her seventh double-double of the season and 27th of her career with 12 terminations and ten digs, as Dykstra posted six kills. Rewerts finished with five kills and seven total blocks in her NCAA Tournament debut, as Sydney Golden registered a team-high 23 assists, while Booth posted 19 assists. Powers, also making her NCAA Tournament debut, led UNI with 17 digs and four aces.
ADDITIONAL NOTES
Friday’s victory was UNI’s first-ever against Illinois, who leads the series 3-1-1. It was also the first time the Panthers and Illini have met in the NCAA Tournament since 1986 when Northern Iowa made its tournament debut.
UNI improves to 17-25 all-time in NCAA Tournament matches, grabbing its first tournament victory since defeating Florida State in the first round in 2022 in Minneapolis.
The Panthers’ win was their first over a Big Ten opponent in the NCAA Tournament since rallying to defeat Minnesota in the second round of the 2001 tournament in Cedar Falls.
UNI has now won 21 consecutive matches, tied for the eight-longest winning streak in school history.
UNI has recorded at least one service ace in 26 consecutive matches, including all but one match this season.
After a 12-kill performance on Friday, Kira Fallert is just ten kills from passing Kim Kester (1999-02) for seventh on the program’s all-time kills list.
Erin Powers has recorded three or more service aces in seven matches this year.
Kacie Rewerts surpassed 600 career block assists on Friday, joining UNI’s Danielle Brazda (2004-07) and Molly O’Brien (2000-03) as the only players in Missouri Valley Conference (MVC) history to do so.
UP NEXT
The Panthers will face the winner of Louisville and Chicago State on Saturday in the second round of the NCAA Tournament. First serve is scheduled for 5 p.m. CT at the KFC Yum! Center with live coverage available on ESPN+ and the Panther Sports Radio Network.
NCAA Volleyball Championship
First Round
Illinois vs. Northern Iowa
UNI Head Coach Bobbi Petersen
(Opening Statement)
“First of all, just want to congratulate Chris (Tamas) and his team on a great season. Their an awesome team and a lot we had to do to prepare and just a big congratulations to our team. I’m just so incredibly proud of the effort that was put in today by everybody. We talked a lot about how when you’re going up against teams of the caliber of Illinois, that it takes everybody. We don’t have one person that’s going to save the day for us, it has to be a team effort in every way, and we definitely did that today. When one person was down, another one would pick them up. I thought we did a really good job of moving on. Obviously Illinois is a very physical team and can put the ball away at a really high level and high pace and we just really moved on. We talked a lot about how one point is the same no matter how its scored, except for when you’re in our practice gym, then it’s different but in a real match, one point is one point, so however you score is however you score. I’m just really proud of the mindset of our kids today.”
(On how well UNI defended against Illinois’ serving game)
“I do still think [Illinois] served really well. It’s not always about aces, it’s getting people and teams out of system, and I thought there was a point in [the match], especially in that third set, where we didn’t feel like we were in system as much. What I loved about our team is [Illinois] have a couple a couple servers that are really, really good. We don’t see that kind of jump top [serve] a lot, so that was new for us, also Raina [Terry] has an incredible serve, and she really started to get into that towards the end of the game. But sometimes it’s just about putting the ball up in the middle of the court and just trying to side out from it. So, we’re not worried about running any complicated offense, we just want this server, we just want that ball in the middle of the court, and we’re trying to run an offense to one of our pins. I thought our kids did a really good job of that. Their communication in the seams was really good tonight. [The seams is] an area that we can be very strong in, and every once in a while, there’s a little bit of doubt in those seams, but I thought we did a really good job of crossing and hitting our responsibilities, which makes a big difference. You saw a couple of times on the jump serve, we didn’t even have time to move with it, and it just happened to be a little bit out, so we kind of lucked out on a few of those. But just the speed at which they serve with we just don’t see that. So, we have big Deb, which is a machine, but it does not simulate anything like a real server. I thought we did a really good job with our serve and pass game for sure.”
(On the possibility of playing Louisville)
“I think the biggest thing is figuring out how to physically be ready to go. I think we have a few players who are pretty beat up. They were beat up at the start of the season and now they’ve had the grind of the season, people who don’t even practice a lot of the days of the week, so making sure they’re as fresh as they possibly can be physically, obviously mentally as well. I don’t think, as a coach, you really don’t have to do a lot for motivation when you’re in the NCAA Tournament. We still think we do and we do a lot of things, but I know our kids will be ready to go and motivated. We’ve had the chance to see Louisville a lot this year, so scouting them, I feel strongly that I know what they do, it’s just a matter of, you can know what teams do but being able to slow them down is a whole different story. Just trying to gameplan tonight, how we’re going to attack if Louisville is the one, the different things they do well and they do a lot well.”