University of Minnesota Athletics
Minnesota Wins Diet Coke Classic
9/5/2010 12:00:00 AM | Volleyball
The Minnesota volleyball team (5-1) defeated No. 20 Dayton (5-1) in three sets by scores of 25-20, 25-13, 25-15 to win the Diet Coke Classic on Saturday, Sept. 4.
Minnesota moved to 2-1 in the tournament with the victory over the Flyers. Dayton and Northern Iowa also finished 2-1, while Baylor was 0-3. The Golden Gophers won the tournament by virtue of winning percentage in sets, which was the first tiebreaker. With the three-set victory over Dayton, Minnesota was 8-4 in sets in the tournament. Northern Iowa finished second with an 8-7 set record, and Dayton was third with a 6-6 set record in the tournament.
Senior middle blocker Lauren Gibbemeyer (St. Paul, Minn.) was named the Most Outstanding Player of the tournament. Junior libero Jessica Granquist (Blaine, Minn.) and sophomore Tabi Love (Dauphin, Manitoba) were also named to the All-Tournament team. Northern Iowa's Bre Payton and Michelle Burow were also named to the All-Tournament team, along with Dayton's Lindsay Fietemier and Rachel Krabacher.
Love hit .412 (17-3-34) with 17 kills and 10 digs, while Ashley Wittman (Shakopee, Minn.) had 16 kills and eight digs for the night. Gibbemeyer hit .450 (9-0-20) with nine kills and six digs. Granquist finished with 28 digs on the night, and had 61 digs in the two matches on Saturday. Stephanie Nucci (Gilbert, Ariz.) finished with 48 assists and 12 digs, and Katherine Harms (Albertville, Minn.) hit .389 (9-2-18) with nine kills and four digs in her first start of the season.
Minnesota trailed 15-14 in the first set, before rattling off six of the next seven points to take a 20-16 lead on a kill by Gibbemeyer. Love delivered a kill to make it 23-19, and Dayton answered with what would be its final point of the set.
Harms and Gibbemeyer finished off the set with a kill to give the Golden Gophers the early 1-0 lead. From that point, Minnesota got hot as it hit .408 (35-6-71) in the final two sets and limited Dayton to a .064 (16-9-78) hitting percentage.
The Golden Gophers hit .352 (54-11-122) for the night, and limited Dayton to a .117 mark. Minnesota also outdug the Flyers 75 to 53, and did not surrender a service ace. The Golden Gophers were outblocked for the first time this year 6.0-to-4.0, but had 54 kills to 30 for Dayton.
Dayton was led by Fletemeier who had 11 kills and five blocks, while Jessica Yanz had 21 assists and a team-high 13 digs. Minnesota will be back in action when it heads to Duke Invitational on Sept. 10-11. The Golden Gophers will face North Carolina Central on Friday, Sept. 10 at 4 p.m. (CT). Minnesota will also face Delaware on Saturday, Sept. 11 at 11 a.m. (CT), and Duke at 6 p.m. (CT).
