Despite the return of senior outside hitter Sarah Gustin and a career night from freshman outside hitter Jenny Rood, the MSU volleyball team lost to Illinois on Friday night.
“You can’t have a couple players come to play, you’ve got to have everybody,” MSU head coach Chuck Erbe said. “This was one of the matches we needed to win. Bottom line, we didn’t get the job done.”
In the match, Rood set a career high with 21 kills and another career high in hitting percentage, as she hit .378 for the match. It was all lost as mistakes were again the Achilles heel of the Spartans as they lost in five games (6-15, 15-4, 12-15, 15-1, 12-15).
“You can’t compete against anybody with 22 serving errors,” Erbe said “I don’t have any answers, ask the players. Maybe they have some answers.”
In her return, Gustin contributed a season high 24 kills. While looking at the final box scores, Gustin said she had no answers either.
The Spartans outhit Illinois .324 to .191, they had 14 blocks to Illinois’ 11 and they dug 56 balls compared to Illinois’ 57 for the match. The only difference was errors, and it was a glaring difference.
“I came back because I was healthy,” Gustin said. “As far as the team went, we came up short. There’s nothing else I can say.”
In game one Illinois jumped ahead 5-0, and never looked back as it won 15-6.
Spartan fans had reason to cheer in game two as MSU turned the tables, opening with a 5-0 run of their own. With the fans behind them the Spartans cruised to a 15-4 game-two win.
Any momentum MSU had entering the break was quickly lost as Illinois opened game three with a 6-0 run.
MSU fought to close the gap to one (8-7), but the Illini pulled out the 15-12 win.
The Spartans responded with authority, winning game four 15-1. It was only the 26th 15-1 victory in Spartan history.
“We beat them 15-1 and 15-4 (during) the games we won,” Gustin said. “Then it was like a totally different team out there the other three games.”
MSU lost game five 12-15, dropping its season record in five-game matches to 3-2 after winning its first three.
Erbe said MSU keeps making an NCAA tournament bid harder and harder to capture.
“Everybody knew the significance of this match,” he said. “Maybe that’s too much pressure on them.”
The Spartans host Purdue on Saturday night at 7.
