September 30, 2000
No. 1 Nebraska remained undefeated for the season and atop the Big 12 Conference standings with a 15-3, 16-14, 15-7 victory over No. 22 Texas A&M Saturday before 4,007 fans at the NU Coliseum.
The victory marks Nebraska's 13th-consecutive win, as they improve to 6-0 in league play. A&M had its four-match winning streak snapped and falls to 8-4 overall and 3-2 in the Big 12.
The Huskers led the entire first game with the exception of a 1-0 A&M lead courtesy of an Erin Gibson ace. The Aggies were held to a -.115 hitting percentage and recorded no blocks, while the Huskers hit .500 and posted five blocks.
There were nine ties in the hard-fought second game before the Huskers broke a 14-14 tie with a kill and an A&M error. The Aggies had built their biggest lead at 6-3 before Nebraska rallied to tie the score at six. The score also was tied at seven and eight before NU took their first lead of the game at 9-8. A&M tied it at nine on a Heather Marshall kill and went up 11-9 on back-to-back Nebraska kill errors. The Huskers later regained serve and scored four consecutive points without a sideout. A&M refused to give in and came back to tie the score at 14-14, but Amber Holmquist put down one of her match-high 15 kills and the Aggies had a kill error to end the game.
A&M built a 4-1 lead to begin game three before Nebraska scored nine unanswered points. The Aggies scored two points on consecutive Husker kill errors, but was held scoreless for the remainder of the game.
Gibson led the Aggies with 11 kills and 10 digs. As a team A&M was held to a .096 hitting percentage while NU hit .287 and outblocked the Aggies 14-3.
"We were bringing a relatively young team into a new environment and it took a full game before we were able to get started," A&M head coach Laurie Corbelli said. "We got rid of some of the jitters and got into more of a rhythm in game two, but Nebraska is very powerful and the effectiveness of their middle blockers took us out of our game. NU has a tough serve in almost every rotation and our passing didn't allow us to get into our system. It was a good experience for our young team. If we can learn from this I will be happy."
Texas A&M will look to break the school record of 24 consecutive home victories when they play host to the Iowa State Cyclones on Wednesday. First serve at G. Rollie White Coliseum is set for 7 p.m.