While Nebraska was cruising against Omaha, in Fayettteville, Arkansas, top-ranked Wisconsin was getting all it could handle from No. 21 Arkansas and diminuitive Jillian Gillen.
Wisconsin rallied from a 24-19 deficit to win the third set, lost the fourth and eventually came away with a 21-25, 25-20, 26-24, 22-25, 15-13 victory.
It was one of just 10 matches on Wednesday, a night that not only saw the No. 4 Huskers throttle Omaha, but included Utah State knocking off Utah and No. 9 BYU beating Loyola Marymount.
There are 36 matches on Thursday’s NCAA Division I volleyball schedule, including Wisconsin back at Arkansas.
Sixth-ranked Oregon is at San Deigo State and No. 25 Purdue goes to Kansas.
Among the other matches, USC is at Hawai’i (the last team out of the AVCA top 25), BYU is home for McNeese, Tennessee is at San Diego, West Virginia plays North Carolina, UC Santa Barbara plays Pepperdine, Colorado plays Northern Colorado and Indiana plays Long Beach State.
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WISCONSIN SURVIVES: Gillen, the 5-foot-7 senior outside, had 22 kills for Arkansas, even a block and 14 digs. And her 5-10 counterpart, Taylor Head, had 14 kills, two aces, also a block and 11 digs. But with the fifth set tied 13-13, Head was blocked by Wisconsin’s 6-9 Anna Smrek and 6-3 Caroline Crawford and then Sarah Franklin ended it with a kill.
“That’s a great road win,” Wisconsin coach Kelly Sheffield said. “We spent most of the match behind in each set, just trying to grind it and fight. That’s a really, really good team, that’s a really well-coached team.
“We got quite a few blocks but it was a real struggle with their speed, their size and their craftiness.”
Devyn Robinson led Wisconsin (3-0) of the Big Ten with 21 kills while hitting .354. She had nine blocks as the Badgers outblocked Arkansas (2-1) of the SEC 17-6.
Smrek had 13 kills, hit .346 and had five blocks and a dig. Carter Booth had 12 kills in 19 errorless attacks and nine blocks, and Franklin had 12 kills and six digs.
Izzy Ashburn had 34 assists and her team hit .295. She had a kill in her only try, an ace and 15 digs. Julia Orzol had three kills but hit negative .045 but had 16 digs. Gülce Güctekin had 22 digs and nine assists.
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