Indiana Volleyball Drops Season-Opener to Nebraska, 3-0
BLOOMINGTON, Ind. — Tommi Stockham admits she was super nervous before her first-ever collegiate volleyball game Friday night in Wilkinson Hall.
Stockham, a freshman for Indiana, thought it was a good thing, and as soon as she got that first kill, the nerves started to go away.
"It definitely felt more comfortable as it went on," Stockham said. "The upperclassmen did a really nice job of keeping us calm during the match."
It was the feeling for most of the freshmen that took the floor Friday against Nebraska. Indiana started four freshmen and two sophomores. As young as the Hoosiers are, they did a lot of good things in their 3-0 loss to No. 5 Nebraska.
Indiana started the match going point-for-point with the Cornhuskers. The Hoosiers had a few service errors to halt some scoring runs, and they lost the first set 25-22.
"I think we gotta serve tough to try to take some risks," Aird said. "We serve easy, it's going to be a challenge to stop them, so it is what it is. Some nights you have better serving nights than others."
The second set was similar to the first. The Hoosiers hung around within two-to-four points for a majority of the set.
Indiana got caught up in a rotation where Nebraska's Lexi Sun began targeting Stockham on every serve, and Stockham struggled to handle some of them.
"We have to make some adjustments to kind of get out that rotation," Aird said. "You can win or lose some matches based on one rotation. It's a weird dichotomy because I want Tommi to feel it, and these young kids to feel that there's no place to hide."
Indiana ended up dropping the second set 25-20.
The third set was where Aird said the Hoosiers looked like a young team.
Indiana had a number of mistakes that showed the youth and learning curve this team is going through right now. The Hoosiers dropped the third set 25-17.
"Made some errors on the third, but on the whole, super proud of our kids," Aird said. "I thought they competed. They were in it for large stretches of time."
This was Indiana's first match in 419 days. It was long break for the Big Ten volleyball community, and Friday's match was a big feeling of relief now that the season is underway.
Stockham led the team with nine kills on the day, and Morgan Geddes had eight. Freshman Brooke Westbeld led the team with 13 assists as well.
Aird was happy he got to see his players finally compete on the court. The Hoosiers, now 0-1 on the season, will get another crack at Nebraska Saturday night.
The game will be played in Wilkinson Hall again with first serve coming at 6 p.m. ET.
"That young core came in and I thought did a great job," Aird said. "We lose the match, but I think I was really proud of the young kids for how they handled themselves. The way they competed. Nowhere to go but up from now."