By James Kay
The Hawkeyes have started their season strong by demolishing their opponents in this past weekend’s Northern Illinois Invitational.
The team dropped only one set in three matches against Loyola, DePaul, and Northern Illinois. The Hawkeyes went into the tournament with a chip on their shoulders after losing to Northern Illinois in their final game of the tournament last year.
In their 3-1 win against Loyola this on Aug. 27, the Hawkeyes held their opponents’ hitting percentage under .230 in three of the four sets of the match. The team won the first set, 25-18, but surrendered the second set, 25-22. They collected themselves, however, and didn’t allow Loyola to reach 20 points in the third or fourth sets. The Hawkeyes finished off Loyola with a 25-9 win to close the match, and senior Jess Janota led the team with 13 kills. Senior Loxley Keala had more assists (43) than Loyola’s roster (34) during the match.
Later in the day, the Hawkeyes breezed by DePaul in straight sets. Head coach Bond Shymansky raved about the play of his outside hitter Lauren Brobst.
“Brobst put on a clinic today,” he said in a release. “Hitting .565, that’s a pretty good batting average. She did a great job of leading us. You can see she has such a confidence out there. You can’t just be comfortable. You have to be confident and be really aggressive. She’s willing to take it to the next level and pound away at the ball.”
Brobst finished the match with a game-high 14 kills.
The Hawkeyes’ toughest task came against Northern Illinois, which fought them hard the whole match. Northern Illinois came within 5 points in each set they played against the Hawkeyes. Brobst led the charge offensively, tallying 16 kills and 1 block. Keala also had a team-high 43 assists to go along with 7 digs.
Shymansky had nothing but praise for his team after finishing off Northern Illinois.
“What a great a win for us,” he said in a release. “To be in a tight situation in a foreign environment and really respond in tough moments with huge swings was huge.”
Brobst capped off her noteworthy weekend performance by capturing the MVP honors for the tournament. She wasn’t the only Hawkeye to be honored; redshirt freshman Meghan Buzzerio and junior Annika Olsen were named to the all-tournament team.
“I really think this is going to be the year we leave our mark in the Big Ten,” senior Alyssa Klostermann said earlier in the week.