Brooklyn DeLeye, one of Kentucky volleyball\u2019s four All-Americans this season, did not have her best offensive performance in the Final Four on Thursday night. <\/p>\n
The junior outside hitter still found a way to land 15 kills, second-most for the Wildcats behind only Eva Hudson\u2019s 29, but it was far from a perfect showing. She finished with a .160 hitting percentage (she\u2019s currently .284 for the entire season) while posting a team-high seven errors. Those numbers are well short of what she\u2019s been doing on a match-by-match and set-by-set basis this season.<\/p>\n
But DeLeye didn\u2019t let those struggles bother her. With her hits not consistently landing, she leaned on being a playmaker in other areas.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe turned into a defensive machine,\u201d Fellow All-American outside hitter Eva Hudson said of her teammate.<\/p>\n
DeLeye finished with 14 digs and a team-best five blocks. Kentucky needed every single one of them to sneak out a thrilling five-set win over Wisconsin<\/a>, sending the Wildcats back to another national championship and the first since winning it all in 2020. Some of her digs looked like something out of a video game. DeLeye still found ways to power home a handful of timely kills, particularly in the fourth and fifth sets. Four of her 15 kills came in the decisive fifth set.<\/p>\n \u201cIf I was dwelling on my performance, I wouldn\u2019t have been able to be there for my teammates,\u201d DeLeye said.<\/p>\n The 2nd dig here by Brooklyn DeLeye looks physically impossible\ud83d\ude33<\/p>\n How does the human body react that quickly and that accurately? pic.twitter.com\/EpL3UccgMS<\/a><\/p>\n