Huskies Sweep LIU Brooklyn, Host Illinois In Round Two

Friday, December 1

Seattle, Wash.

7:31 PM

University of Washington

25-7, 14-6Pac-12

LIU Brooklyn

20-10, 11-3NEC

LIU Brooklyn

Washington

December 01, 2017 | Volleyball

Box Score Box Score PDF Watch: Top Husky Highlights Read: Tanner Creates Own Legacy

By: UW Athletic Communications

SEATTLE – Kicking off their 16th consecutive NCAA tournament appearance, the Huskies got a 16th consecutive NCAA first round victory, sweeping LIU Brooklyn at Alaska Airlines Arena tonight, 25-10, 25-13, 25-18. Seeded No. 8 overall, the Huskies (25-7) hit a season-high .478 tonight to handle the Northeast Conference Champions in front of 2,814 in attendance.

Washington will now have a big challenge on Saturday night in the second round, taking on an Illinois squad that survived a comeback attempt from Hawaii in tonight's first match in Alaska Airlines Arena. The Fighting Illini (22-10) cruised to a 2-0 lead, 25-18 and 25-17, before the Rainbow Wahine (20-8) responded with 25-13 and 26-24 wins to force a fifth set, but Illinois pulled away late to win it 15-10 and advance to meet the Huskies.

First serve in tomorrow's second round will be at 7:00 p.m., streamed live on GoHuskies.com.

Washington's offense was clicking as senior setter Bailey Tanner had 35 assists and mixed things up well. Sophomore Kara Bajema led all players with 15 kills, hitting .355, and senior Courtney Schwan had 10 kills without an error for a .556 attack percentage. Lauren Sanders and Crissy Jones both went 5-0-8 for .625 attack percentages and Avie Niece had four kills on seven swings to hit .571.

Senior Tia Scambray served up four aces to pass two more Huskies (Dragana Djordjevic and four-time All-American Christal Morrison) on the career aces list. Scambray is now fourth in school history with 145 aces. She also had 13 digs tonight. The Huskies had 10 aces and a 7.0 to 1.0 blocking advantage.

"First of all congratulations to LIU Brooklyn and Ken Ko and all of his players for being conference champions and coming out here and representing themselves well," said Husky Head Coach Keegan Cook, who is 3-0 now in NCAA first round matchups. "They played hard all three sets, especially that last set they did a nice job. A big congratulations to them on their season."

Cook was looking forward to the senior class of seven getting one more big-time match tomorrow in their home arena. "I'm excited for this group and the match they're going to play tomorrow at Alaska Airlines Arena," said Cook. "They did a nice job tonight, and I thought we were better in transition. Any time you're hitting with the numbers we hit you're doing a lot of good things in transition. We've been working on that, but I know there are some plays that we still want to make, a few block moves they want to make, a few serves they want to hit and I'm excited for them to make those plays tomorrow night."

Bajema had the first kill of the match on the first rally, then quickly added two more to knot the opening set at 3-3. At 4-4, the Huskies made their first move with a 7-0 run on Bajema's service. Schwan picked up her first two kills and Carly DeHoog added a pair with Bajema also dropping an ace down at the back line. Lauren Sanders put down a quick set from Tanner to spark another long Husky run on Scambray's serve. Schwan buried one crosscourt to keep the Dawgs rolling and then Bajema had a pancake dig and Schwan hit offspeed over the block for another point and a 15-6 lead. A Scambray ace forced the final Blackbirds timeout at 17-6. Jones hit one down out of the timeout and another Scambray ace made it 21-6 before LIU snapped the 10-0 run. Tanner dumped one for her first kill to reach set point at 24-9, and Bajema finished two points later to end it, 25-10. The Huskies hit a hot .517 in set one, with Schwan finishing off seven kills on 11 swings without an error to hit .636.

The Blackbirds got the first three points of the second set, but DeHoog snapped that with a left side finish and the Huskies got even at 4-4. Schwan got a serving run going as Bajema picked up two more kills for a 9-6 Husky lead. Jones dialed up an ace and then Tanner found Sanders on two straight transition blasts out of the middle to force a Brooklyn timeout at 13-7. DeHoog and Sanders roofed the Blackbirds to make it 15-8 and then Tanner followed that right up with an ace for 16-8. The Blackbirds got three points off the lead but the Huskies answered with another 3-0 run to push it back to eight at 19-11 as Destiny Julye subbed in and had her first kill followed by Bajema's second ace. Scambray lofted a perfect set to DeHoog for a kill and then senior Marion Hazelwood got into the mix with a kill from Tanner to reach set point at 24-13. On the next point, Tanner turned on a hanging ball above the net and whaled it off the block for a kill to end it, 25-13. UW was on target again in the set, hitting .481, with four aces and eight different players getting a kill in the frame.

Sophomore Avie Niece came in to start set three in the middle, as Bajema opened the set with a left pin finish. The first seven points ended on kills for both teams, two more from Bajema, until a LIU service error for 4-4. McPherson got an ace off the top of the net for 7-5 Dawgs. Jones and Bajema teamed for a stuff to make it 9-7. Bajema kept connecting and a block for Niece and DeHoog expanded the lead to 13-9. Tanner then dropped an ace to the far corner for 14-9. Tanner saved a pass off the net, bumping it straight up, and Niece hit it down to reach the media timeout at 15-10. Senior Jade Finau checked in midway through the set and found Niece for a kill right away. Scambray delivered her fourth ace for 18-11, forcing a Blackbirds timeout. Julye came in for Schwan and put one crosscourt for a kill and then Jones and Finau had a rejection for 21-15 and LIU Brooklyn took its last timeout. Sophomore Cailin Onosko checked in for the first time and helped serve the Huskies to match point at 24-17. The Dawgs finished it off, 25-18, as Finau set Niece in serve-receive for a slam. Bajema delivered eight kills in the third set alone, as the Huskies hit .441, while Niece had all four of her kills in the set.