{"id":70413,"date":"2025-11-26T07:55:10","date_gmt":"2025-11-26T07:55:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/70413\/"},"modified":"2025-11-26T07:55:10","modified_gmt":"2025-11-26T07:55:10","slug":"unc-volleyball-survives-sacramento-state-in-tournament-semifinal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/70413\/","title":{"rendered":"UNC volleyball survives Sacramento State in tournament semifinal"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Sacramento State and UNC volleyball teams met for the third time this season Tuesday night in a Big Sky Conference Tournament semifinal match.<\/p>\n

The match at Bank of Colorado Arena in Greeley was the best of the three, and the match might have been one of the best in the Big Sky this season.<\/p>\n

UNC outlasted the Hornets 3-2 with a 20-18 win in the fifth set to earn a spot in the conference tournament championship match for the second time in two years and fourth time dating to 2021.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

In the back-and-forth fifth, a set normally played to 15 points in college, there were nine ties and four lead changes before Bears senior middle blocker Zoe Gibbs ended the evening on UNC\u2019s sixth match point.\n<\/p>\n

Gibbs scored two of the Bears\u2019 final three points to close out the match, avenging a loss to the Hornets in last season\u2019s five-set conference tournament championship in Sacramento. Gibbs finished with eight kills and five blocks.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cYeah, that was a burn burner,\u201d UNC coach Lyndsey Oates said of the win. \u201cThat\u2019s as close as it gets. I think they had three match points that we were able to withstand. We didn\u2019t play perfect. We missed a couple of serves down at the end. We played really hard and we did just enough to pull out that match.\u201d<\/p>\n

PHOTOS: UNC volleyball outlasts Sacramento State<\/a><\/p>\n

Oates and senior outside hitter Bella Van Lannen credited the Bears\u2019 resilience after its second five-set match in two days in the conference tournament. UNC beat Montana State in five sets in a quarterfinal Monday night.\n<\/p>\n

The third-seeded Bears (16-15) go for their eighth Big Sky tournament title in Oates\u2019 21 seasons as head coach Wednesday night at Bank of Colorado Arena. UNC is hosting the tournament as the 2024 regular-season champion.<\/p>\n

The Bears will meet No. 8 Idaho State for only the second time this season at 7 p.m. Wednesday for the Big Sky title and automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament. UNC beat ISU in three sets Nov. 13 in Greeley. Idaho State upset No. 1 seed Northern Arizona in a quarterfinal Monday, and the Bengals beat No. 4 Weber State in the first semifinal Tuesday.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cWe just saw a lot of resilience, I think,\u201d said Van Lannen, who had a season-high 16 kills and 17 points. \u201cAnd especially from a senior class, I think, coming in and not letting the emotions get to us. It\u2019s fight, next point, fight, next point. No matter what, we were just looking to each other that whole match.<\/p>\n

UNC and second-seeded Sacramento State were the nightcap match Tuesday, and they were worth the wait.<\/p>\n

The Bears swept the two matches during the regular season, beating the Hornets 2-1 Oct. 9 in Greeley and in five sets a month later in Sacramento.
\n\"NorthernNorthern Colorado Bears middle blocker Isabel Bennet (5) celebrates winning a set during a semifinal match against Sacramento State in the Big Sky Conference volleyball tournament at Bank of Colorado Arena on the campus of the University of Northern Colorado in Greeley on Tuesday, Nov. 25, 2025. (Brice Tucker\/Staff Photographer)\n<\/p>\n

\u201cLyndsey\u2019s teams are really good all the time, and they\u2019re so good defensively and just put so much pressure on you,\u201d Sacramento State coach Ruben Volta said after the match. \u201cWe\u2019re pretty good offensively and we had moments of struggle offensively because they played really good\u00a0 defensive.\u201d<\/p>\n

UNC\u2019s Alayna Tessena tied the fifth at 16-16 with a kill. Tessena had a team-high 17 kills for the Bears. Setter Nerea Alvarez-Jorge had 52 assists guiding the offense with seven kills and team-high six blocks.<\/p>\n

The teams then traded service errors, with Leila Ballard and Mia Liddiard faltering for UNC with the ball in their hands. In between, Sacramento State\u2019s Victoria Marthaler\u2019s service error tied the match again at 17-17. The Hornets went ahead 18-17 on Liddiard\u2019s error.\u00a0Marthaler had a match-best 23 kills with three blocks and a service ace.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s certainly a pressure situation we have to handle better,\u201d Oates said of the back-to-back service errors, noting Ballard and Liddiard are two of the Bears\u2019 best servers. \u201cWe have to be better than that. I know we\u2019re going to handle that situation better the next time we get in it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gibbs got a point back on a kill. Sacramento State lost a challenge to an officials\u2019 call on a Brynn Reines\u2019 kill, giving the Bears the lead at 19-18 before Gibbs’ match winner.<\/p>\n

UNC led 14-10 in the fifth set \u2014that’s four cracks at match point Sacramento State held off. The Hornets tied the set 14-14, starting an exchange of points almost the rest of the way.<\/p>\n

Oates said UNC panicked and turned into a tight team, not playing free as it had done earlier, with the 14-10 lead.<\/p>\n

\"NorthernNorthern Colorado Bears outside hitter Bella Van Lannen (2) digs the ball during a semifinal match against Sacramento State in the Big Sky Conference volleyball tournament at Bank of Colorado Arena on the campus of the University of Northern Colorado in Greeley on Tuesday, Nov. 25, 2025. (Brice Tucker\/Staff Photographer)<\/p>\n

Volta said the service errors late in the fifth set came from players trying to be aggressive.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou just saw a really good match with two teams who didn\u2019t want to lose,\u201d the coach said. \u201cYou don\u2019t want them to pass well and just crush a ball on you, so you\u2019re trying to put pressure on them. I\u2019m really proud of my team and it was a great match.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Sacramento State and UNC volleyball teams met for the third time this season Tuesday night in a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":70414,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[41430,41444,551,41431,41437,41497,121,123,122,41432,41496],"class_list":["post-70413","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sacramento","tag-bank-of-colorado-arena","tag-big-sky-conference-volleyball-tournament","tag-colorado","tag-greeley","tag-lyndsey-oates","tag-ruben-volta","tag-sacramento","tag-sacramento-headlines","tag-sacramento-news","tag-sacramento-state-volleyball","tag-university-of-northern-colorado-volleyball"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70413","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=70413"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70413\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/70414"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=70413"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=70413"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=70413"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}