No. 10 Kansas Handed First Loss of the Season by No. 9 Creighton

Saturday, September 21

Lawrence, Kan.

3 PM

University of Kansas

9-1,0-0Big 12

#9 Creighton

9-2,0-0Big East

Creighton

Kansas

No. 10 Kansas Handed First Loss of the Season by No. 9 Creighton

9/21/2024 3:06:00 PM | Women's Volleyball

Box Score

LAWRENCE, Kan. - The No. 10 Kansas Jayhawks dropped their second Top 10 battle of the weekend, 3-0, versus the No. 9 Creighton Bluejays to close out the final match of the Jayhawk Classic.

"I'm not sure we're going to see a team any better than that this season," said Kansas Head Coach Ray Bechard about Creighton. "They're one of the top teams in the country, but we feel like we can be too. They were closer to their true identity today than we were."

Both teams entered the match undefeated on the weekend as they each beat No. 6 Purdue in four sets while Kansas also had a clean sweep over the Tulsa Golden Hurricanes on Friday night.

Each squad was plagued early with mistakes as Creighton missed three serves while Kansas mislaid one itself and tacked on four hitting errors to call its first timeout at the 11-7 Bluejay advantage. The Jayhawks narrowed it two after the break but couldn't close the gap as Creighton picked up five blocks and out hit the Jayhawks .378 to .079 to win the first set 25-17.
The second set featured more back-and-forth action as there were five ties at the 12-12 mark. Between Ayah Elnady's five kills and Toyosi Onabanjo's two assisted blocks with London Davis and Camryn Turner Kansas earned the slight edge at the media timeout, leading 15-12.

Another big block by Onabanjo and Bien would give Kansas its last advantage of the set at 17-16 before a 5-0 Creighton run forced a KU timeout. Bien came out and earned her sixth kill on the day while Reese Ptacek added her own on the next play to cut it back down within two, but that would be the last Jayhawk points as the Bluejays snagged the second, 25-19.

Creighton narrowly led throughout the beginning of the third set before Kansas swung a lead at 8-7 from back-to-back Davis kills. The Bluejays quickly regained and stretched their margin to 18-13, forcing Kansas to take its last timeout. A 7-4 Creighton run closed out the match for their 25-17, third set 3-0 victory.

"If someone asked me before the season started how I'd feel about 9-1 in the first 10 matches, I'd probably be pretty excited, but it's tough when the 10th one was that, and we know we're a better team than that, but it just has to do with how Creighton showed up today," said Bechard.

Up next, the Jayhawks will host the UCF Knights in Horejsi on Wednesday, September 25 with an earlier start time of 6 p.m. This match will be on ESPN, and fans can also follow along with Kansas' StatBroadcast and social media platforms for more in-match coverage.