The Kansas-Nebraska volleyball match Nov. 12 will be shown at 6 p.m. Nov. 16 on the College Sports Television network. CSTV is available on satellite (DirecTV channel 610) and cable (Sunflower Broadband digital channel 147). KU and the Huskers will meet at 7 p.m. at the Nebraska Coliseum.
Janaina Correa knew something wasn’t right when pain shot through her knee during warm-ups at Oklahoma last fall.
Correa, then a freshman on Kansas University’s volleyball team, tore her anterior cruciate ligament prior to the match, and her first season at KU abruptly ended after 17 matches.
Correa was forced to watch from the sideline as the Jayhawks went on to earn their first NCAA Tournament berth in team history.
“It was one of the hardest things I’ve had to do in my life — just watching,” said Correa, now a sophomore.
Tonight Correa, after eight months of rehabilitation and one bulky leg brace later, will be back on the court when the Jayhawks open their season in Fayetteville, Ark., against defending Southeastern Conference Western Division champion Arkansas.
“I’m just happy to be playing again,” said Correa, who will wear the brace until November. “The time off kind of makes me appreciate it even more. Before it was fun, but now it’s magnified. It’s like 10 times more fun just the feeling to play again.”
The Jayhawks definitely should be tested in their debut.
The Razorbacks, a perfect 10-0 in home openers, return three all-SEC players from a team that went 27-7 and advanced to the second round of the NCAA Tournament last season.
“Who did the scheduling?” KU coach Ray Bechard quipped of starting against a powerful Arkansas squad.
“But I wouldn’t have scheduled the match at Arkansas if I didn’t think these kids could handle it,” Bechard said of his squad, which returns all but one starter from a team that posted a program-best 13-7 Big 12 Conference record (tied for third) a year ago.
Correa has been back on the volleyball court for a little over a month and said her health was “about 95 percent” back.
That bodes well for the Jayhawks, who will need a strong showing from the hard-hitting Brazilian after losing kills leader Sarah Rome to graduation.
While waiting has been hard for Correa, she said it has helped her raise her own expectations, and that of the Jayhawks.
“This team can go very far this year,” she said. “We expect to go to the Sweet 16 this year. We went to the second round last year so we’re going to work hard this year to go to the Sweet 16, and see how far we can go in the NCAA Tournament.”
Richard Gwin/Journal-World PhotoMALIBU, CALIF. ? Kansas University volleyball players missed the first flakes of snow to fall in Lawrence this season, and that was just fine with them.
And not just because they were having a sunny poolside retreat before a Wednesday afternoon practice.
The Jayhawks are enjoying their program’s first-ever trip to the NCAA tournament. They will play Long Beach State at 6 p.m. CST today at Pepperdine University.
KU coach Ray Bechard is hoping his team is not satisfied with history already made.
“We want to play really well, we want to win a couple of matches, and we want to enjoy ourselves,” Bechard said. In his sixth season at KU, the Jayhawks finished third in the Big 12 Conference race with a 13-7 mark, their best-ever conference record.
No matter what happens today, the 21-10 Kansas team already has put its name in the record book by becoming the first squad in the 28-year history of the KU volleyball program to make the tournament.
Neither that fact nor the triumphs and tears shared to get to this point are lost on senior Sarah Rome.
“History doesn’t happen in a day,” said Rome, who last week became KU’s all-time kills leader with 1,275. “To make history, you need stepping stones. That’s what three years ago was for us.”
Four years ago, when Rome arrived in Lawrence from her home in Eagan, Minn., Kansas was happy just to be hovering around the .500 mark. In 2000, KU went 15-14.
“That was the stepping stone to something great that has come to us today,” she said. “It’s been a hard fight all the way, and the NCAA tournament is going to be another dogfight.”
It’s a fight in which KU will be the underdog.
At 19-10, Long Beach State has a record similar to KU’s, but there’s a big difference: The 49ers have been this far before.
Actually, they’ve been quite a bit farther.
Long Beach State has won three NCAA volleyball championships since 1989 and qualified in 17 straight NCAA tourneys.
Despite the odds and the new setting, Kansas players said they were staying focused on the competition — but want to have fun at the same time.
“We’re trying really hard to stay focused,” said sophomore setter Andi Rozum, who probably will bring the biggest KU cheering section to Pepperdine — she has several relatives living in the Los Angeles area. “But there’s always going to be that excitement factor.”
With eight matches remaining in the Big 12 Conference season, the Kansas University volleyball team is on the NCAA Tournament hot seat once again.
A sixth-place finish and 10-10 conference record a year ago weren’t good enough to get the Jayhawks in the Big Dance. This year, Kansas (14-9 overall) is 6-6 in the Big 12 and once again in sixth place. That tells KU coach Ray Bechard it’s time for his team to do some moving and shaking if it wants to reach the postseason.
The first step is a Border War match against No. 25 Missouri at 7 tonight at Horejsi Center.
“November’s a critical month with eight matches to go,” Bechard said, “and this is a critical week with a ranked team, as well as a team like Texas that’s right there with us in the rankings. We know there’s no margin for error.”
In the previous meeting this season, the Tigers edged Kansas in five games in Columbia, Mo. The Jayhawks played well overall, but had some communication breakdowns in Game 5.
“We played great in the five-game match, but in the fifth game we made some errors that we know we shouldn’t have made,” sophomore middle blocker Josi Lima said. “This time we need to be more focused and not make those mistakes.”
The loss to Missouri came in sophomore setter Andi Rozum’s fifth game back from a hip and groin injury. The Jayhawks have been much more in sync in the eight matches since then, but have gone just 4-4 during that span. That includes two more five-game losses.
Kansas has played 10 five-game sets this season and is just 4-6 in those matches. It’s a number Bechard says he’d like to see reversed. If that were the case, the seat wouldn’t be quite so hot and the Jayhawks would be on easy street to the postseason.
Instead, they’ll try to reverse their fortunes tonight.
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ENHANCED COVERAGE
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Jayhawks get bid
2003 photo gallery