Top-seeded Louisville volleyball cruises past Chicago State to start NCAA Tournament

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) - Top-seeded Louisville volleyball mostly cruised in its first step towards trying to play in a hometown Final Four.

The Cardinals swept Chicago State in three sets Friday night at the KFC Yum! Center and will face Northern Iowa tomorrow night at 6 p.m. Generally, UofL overmatched a Cougar squad that had just nine players and was making its first NCAA Tournament appearance as a program.

"It feels good to get that first tournament win under our belt, we have quite a few players that haven't played or haven't played a big role in a tournament match and we got some jitters out and played well," Louisville head coach Dani Busboom Kelly said. "I thought our crowd was great, it was a little bit of a quiet game, but I loved that it was pretty full."

So was the scoring stat sheet for Louisville. Four Cardinals finished the match with at least 7 kills: Sofia Maldonado Diaz, Charitie Luper, Anna DeBeer and Reese Robins. Luper and Maldonado Diaz, who was playing in her first NCAA Tournament game, tied for the team lead with 9 kills each. 

"That's one of the strengths of running a six-two, so we have to use it and use it as much as we can," Busboom Kelly said of the scoring distribution. "Our goal is to get everybody some confidence and some great swings and get our setters in a good rhythm on both sides of the court. So, I thought it was a good job by our setters mixing it up and I thought our players did a good job of taking advantage of it."

Maldonado Diaz stood out on a night where Louisville found some more rest for some of its stars and got different players involved in the rotation. She thought she was able to play more freely after talking some to Busboom Kelly earlier in the week about what to expect in an NCAA Tournament match.

"I think the way she approaches the ball, she's a really dynamic attacker," Busboom Kelly said. "And when she's slow to the ball, you can tell she's hesitating and when she's driving hard and getting on top of it, even if she's blocked, you know she's going for it.

"I could tell tonight she was feeling it, and it was great to see her play the way she did tonight. We're going to need that and we've needed it this whole year and we especially need it moving forward. She's got to be someone we can give not-great sets to and trust that she's going to do something good with them."

Anna DeBeer and Charitie Luper had five kills each in an opening set that saw Louisville hit .560 as a team. The Cardinals started on a 7-0 run and comfortably took it 25-10.

The second set was not as sharp for the Cards. They won it 25-18, but were a tad sloppy in doing so. Six attack errors helped keep the visitors in it, then Louisville went on a 5-0 run in the middle of the set to grab a 17-11 lead for some separation.

Busboom Kelly may have again emphasized the importance of playing clean volleyball following that set, just like she did in the pre-match news conference on Thursday afternoon. Louisville dominated its way to take 17 of the first 20 points before winning it 25-13 to advance to the second round. 

As for Northern Iowa, Louisville swept the Panthers at home back on Sept. 14. Busboom Kelly isn't using that to underestimate the team standing in the way of another Sweet 16 berth for the Cardinals.

"I think UNI is a really tough team to play because they play a great brand of volleyball, and when you play teams like that, they force you to play really well on your side," Busboom Kelly said. "So, we know we're more physical than them, but that can get neutralized just by playing clean and playing the game really well."

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