INSIDE VOLLEYBALL BY DIANE NORDSTROM @BadgerVBall SCHEDULE
Last Week Oct. 12 Oct. 13
at #3 Nebraska at Iowa
Indiana
L, 0-3 W, 3-2
This Week Wednesday at #10 Minnesota 7 p.m. Friday
7 p.m.
Up Next Oct. 26 Oct. 28 Nov. 2 Nov. 4
#25 Illinois 7 p.m.
Northwestern 1 p.m. at #20 Ohio State 6 p.m. at #1 Penn State 1 p.m.
Senior Mary Ording leads the Badgers and ranks sixth in the Big Ten with 1.16 blocks per set.
Badgers back on the
winning track UW ends four-match losing streak
I
t's hard to believe, but the 2012 volleyball sea- son is winding down. Wisconsin is more than half- way through its matches and wraps up the first half of the Big Ten season this week. "From where we were in preseason and where we wanted to be, I think the pre- conference play went really
44 » VARSITY OCTOBER 18, 2012
well," said head coach Pete Waite on his team's progress. "Big Ten Conference play is tough. We had a lot of ranked teams every weekend." The Badgers are currently 15-6 overall and tied for sev- enth in the Big Ten at 3-5. Wisconsin needs just one more win to equal its season win total from 2011.
Badger Block! » Most coaches will tell you that de- fense wins games and volleyball is no different. One of the reasons for the Badgers' success this season has been their block. Wisconsin av- erages 2.76 blocks per set, its high- est season average since 2007. UW ranks third in the Big Ten in blocks per set while foes put up just 1.62 blocks per set.
The Badgers have two indi-
viduals that rank among the top- 10 blockers in the league as senior Mary Ording is sixth with 1.16 per set while senior Alexis Mitchell is seventh with 1.14 stuffs per set.
Moving up the rankings » Wisconsin took a big jump up in the NCAA RPI this week, moving up seven spots to 46th. The RPI is one of the primary tools used by the NCAA Committee to select teams to the tournament.
The Big Ten has 10 teams in the top 50 with Wisconsin coming in as the 10th conference team in the rankings.
