A few games shy of being halfway through the Big Ten volleyball season, UW is still making lineup changes and tweaking rosters from game to game.
The team saw three significant lineup changes this weekend, along with some different substitution patterns.
“I just felt it was needed,” head coach Pete Waite said.
“It wasn’t working the other way so why stay with it. Our team has been really good about staying open no matter what rotation we start, no matter what people we start, no matter who finishes or who is in between.”
Perhaps the biggest lineup change of the season occurred this weekend, as junior Lisa Zukowski was moved from outside hitter to libero.
Going into weekend play against No. 23 Michigan State and Michigan, Waite hinted at some possible lineup changes, but many would not have predicted the move he made.
Zukowski responded well to her new position by leading the team in digs against Michigan State with 14. Watching her sprint around the court diving for balls, it would be easy to assume she had been playing libero her entire life.
Replacing the void Zukowski left at outside hitter were sophomores Jill Odenthal and Marian Weidner.
“Odie got in there on the left side, and we have been asking her to go right side, left side, [and] Marian [to go] left side, right side,” Waite explained. “We are trying all different things.”
Odenthal was a starter at the beginning of the season, when senior tri-captain Lori Rittenhouse was starting at middle blocker. A few tournaments into the season, Waite moved Rittenhouse back to outside hitter and inserted freshman Lauren Ford at middle blocker. Ford was then replaced a few weekends later by Sheila Shaw. This move resulted in Odenthal coming in off the bench.
“I just go out there and play really hard,” Odenthal said. “I just lost my cousin in a car accident, and he is only my age and it just really makes me wonder. If he can die at 19, what else can happen? Go out every game, and swing at every ball, and give it your all.”
Against Michigan State, Odenthal was second on the team in kills, with 17, behind senior tri-captain Erin Byrd’s career-best 29 kills. The following night she put down 11 kills, third on the team in total kills.
Another significant lineup change was the insertion of junior defensive specialist Jill Maier into the game. Maier served and played back row for Odenthal or Weidner.
“She is just making so much progress, and I told her she just kind of makes it in chunks,” Waite said.
“It took a couple of years, and then last spring she made a big move. Then in the last two weeks she made another big move in confidence and her game. She is just a great athlete. She is so quick out there — you can just see it in some of the spurts she made. That just gives us some great energy out there.”
Maier had nine and eight digs against Michigan State and Michigan, respectively.
The last tweak Waite made in the lineup was alternating Ford and senior Amy Hultgren at times in the middle blocker position. Friday night, Ford had six kills to Hultgren’s four, whereas Saturday night Hultgren put down seven kills with Ford contributing only four.
“It is a big confidence booster for us to come out with a new lineup and play like that against a good team like Michigan State,” Waite said. “It doesn’t mean you can’t win with something different. The changes we made in the lineup are working well. I think we have found something we are clicking with.”
The Badgers hope they have finally found their best lineup, as the Big Ten race is really starting to heat up and there is no longer an undefeated team in the conference. To make a run at the title, the Badgers will have to adjust quickly to their new lineup and come out firing on all cylinders for the rest of the season.
