Volleyball Hosts Iowa State Tuesday Night

This Weekend
Creighton (1-2) continues its difficult non-conference schedule, hosting Iowa State (2-1) on Tuesday night at 7:05 pm.
The match will be held at the Omaha Civic Auditorium (9,377) in Omaha, Neb.

Radio Broadcast Information
Tuesday's match can heard on KVSS (88.9 FM), and will be streamed live for free on-line at http://www.kvss.com as well as http://www.gocreighton.com. Brad Burwell and Erin Swanson will call the action.

Video Webcast Information
Tuesday's match will be video webcast and can be seen at www.gocreighton.com. Fans can sign up to buy a single match for $4.95 by clicking on the “Sign Up” graphic below the video box on the top right of the page or buy a season pass for $39.95.

Live Stats Information
Tuesday's match will have live stats. Visit www.gocreighton.com and click on the Live Stats tab on the left-hand side of the page for links the exact link.

Scouting Creighton
Creighton brings a 1-2 record into Tuesday's non-conference match with Iowa State, including a 3-0 win over Texas A&M. Both of CU's losses have come to nationally-ranked teams, as CU fell to No. 16 Minnesota (3-0) and No. 21 LSU (3-2) before sweeping the Aggies.
Senior Korie Lebeda (8.91 aps) is a two-time first-team all-MVC pick and already owns the school record with 4,320 career assists.
One of the teams biggest strengths is its offensive diversity, as seven different players own 250 or more career kills. Jessica Houts is one of six players averaging at least 1.00 kills per set this year, leading the way so far with 3.55 kps.
Defensively, senior libero Bianca Rivera (2.64 dps.) set school records for single-season digs and digs per set last fall. She owns 10 or more digs in 32 of 34 career matches at Creighton.
Creighton, coming off back-to-back 21-10 seasons, has been picked third in the preseason MVC poll.

Scouting Iowa State
Ranked No. 18 in the AVCA's preseason poll, Iowa State is 2-1 after opening play in the Panther Invitational last weekend in Milwaukee. The Cyclones beat Illinois State (3-1), lost at Wisconsin-Milwaukee (3-2) and then closed the weekend with a sweep of Mississippi (3-0).
Victoria Henson averaged 3.58 kills while Jen Malcom averaged 3.00 kills and 1.33 blocks per set while hitting .464. Preseason all-Big 12 pick Kaylee Manns averaged 11.00 assists and 3.75 digs per set. ISU averaged 3.12 blocks per set, paced by Debbie Stadick's 1.67 bps.
Iowa State returns four starters from last season's 19-14 team that reached the Sweet 16 of the NCAA Tournament.

Series History vs. Iowa State
Iowa State owns a 3-2 lead in the series with Creighton since 1994, including a 2-0 mark in Omaha. In fact, road teams have won four of the five meetings in this series.
Kirsten Bernthal Booth is 1-2 against ISU and also 1-1 against Christy Johnson. Booth's first matches at Creighton were a tournament at Iowa State, while Johnson's first matches at Iowa State was a tournament played at Creighton.

The Coaches
Creighton is coached by Kirsten Bernthal Booth (Truman State, 1997), who owns an 89-65 record in her sixth season with the Bluejays. She became the program's all-time winningest coach on Aug. 25, 2007 with a 3-0 win over Stephen F. Austin.
Booth came to Creighton after going 112-41 in three years at Kirkwood Community College in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. A native of Lincoln, Neb., Booth played volleyball at Truman State, where she was named conference MVP, an Academic All-American and Missouri's 1997 NCAA Woman of the Year. She ranked third in Division II history with 6,077 assists when she graduated.
Booth is helped by associate head coach Paul Giesselmann, assistant coach Angie Oxley Behrens and volunteer assistant Adam Ybarra.
Iowa State is coached by Christy Johnson (Nebraska, 1996), who owns a 58-41 record in her fourth year with the Cyclones. An Omaha native who spent one year coaching at Millard North High School, Johnson was the starting setter on Nebraska's 1995 NCAA championship team. She is assisted by Dawn Sullivan and her husband, Joe Lynch.

Series History vs. Iowa State
Iowa State owns a 3-2 lead in the series with Creighton since 1994, including a 2-0 mark in Omaha. In fact, road teams have won four of the five meetings in this series.
Kirsten Bernthal Booth is 1-2 against ISU and also 1-1 against Christy Johnson. Booth's first match at Creighton was a 3-1 loss at Iowa State on Aug. 29, 2003.

Last Meeting With Iowa State
Creighton beat Iowa State in Ames when the teams met last fall on Aug. 28, 2007 in four sets (30-24, 27-30, 30-18, 30-21).
Impressively, the Jays played the majority of the match without the services of two-time all-MVC MB Kelly Goc, who turned an ankle midway through the first set. In Goc's absence, Lauren Bloemke had a brilliant match, finishing with 18 kills, three aces and three blocks while hitting .324. Helping out Bloemke was Jessica Houts Allie Oelke (13 kills, nine digs).
Iowa State was led by 14 kills and 10 digs from Erin Boeve, while Lauren Cummings had 11 kills. The Cyclones played that match without the services of starting setter Kaylee Manns, who was suspended for the match.

Last Weekend Summary
Creighton went 1-2 in three home matches at the Bluejay Invitational. Creighton was swept by No. 16 Minnesota, fell in five games to No. 21 LSU and then swept Texas A&M.
Jessica Houts led Creighton with 3.55 kills and 0.91 blocks per set and was the lone Bluejay named to the All-Tournament Team.

Big 12 Barometer
Ever wonder how a team picked third in the MVC might fare in the Big 12 Conference? Creighton swept the Big 12's predicted fourth-place team (Texas A&M) on Aug. 30th and still has matches remaining with the league's teams picked second (Nebraska on Oct. 5th), sixth (Iowa State on Sept. 2nd) and tied for eighth (Oklahoma on Sept. 13th).

Break Out The Brooms
Creighton's 3-0 win over Texas A&M was the team's second-ever sweep over a Big 12 Conference foe, joining the 3-0 blanking of Iowa State on Sept. 1, 2000. Tuesday night will be Creighton's 24th all-time match against Big 12 competition.

400th Match For Creighton
Tuesday night will be the 400th for Creighton since the program was reinstated in 1994. CU is 182-217 in that time. Below is a look at Creighton's record in 50-match increments, as well as some milestone matches in that time.
Match Numbers W-L Record Coach(es)
1-50 12-38 Guiliano
51-100 22-28 Guiliano/Wallace
101-150 20-30 Wallace
151-200 24-26 Wallace
201-250 17-33 Wallace/Booth
251-300 27-23 Booth
301-350 30-20 Booth
351-399 30-19 Booth

Match No. Opponent Result Date
50 Missouri State L 1-3 10/29/95
100 Northern Iowa L 2-3 10/17/97
150 at Drake W 3-2 10/01/99
200 at Missouri State L 0-3 09/16/01
250 vs. Loyola Marymount L 0-3 09/06/03
300 Northern Iowa L 1-3 11/12/04
350 at Indiana State W 3-0 09/30/06

Houts Named To All-Tourney Team
Making her return from a torn ACL that cost her most of last season, Jessica Houts averaged 3.55 kills and 0.91 blocks per set to earn all-Tournament Team honors at the Bluejay Invitational last weekend.
Houts led CU with 13 kills, eight digs and .346 in the season-opener against No. 16 Minnesota. She followed that up with a team-best 18 kills and six digs in a five-set loss against No. 21 LSU. She also added eight kills and four blocks in a sweep of Texas A&M, a team picked for fourth in the preseason Big 12 Conference poll.
Minnesota's Brook Dieter was named MVP, and was joined on the all-Tournament team by Rachel Hartmann (Minnesota), Brittnee Cooper (LSU), Elena Martinez (LSU), Mary Batis (Texas A&M) and Houts.

Double-Double Decker
Fifth year senior Carolyn Decker had a match-high 15 digs to go with 13 kills as Creighton became the only team to sweep Texas A&M at the Bluejay Invitational.
Decker's double-double against the Aggies was the senior's first since Nov. 20, 2004 and her 15 digs were her most in a match since a 17-dig performance in the 2005 season opener against Northern Colorado.
Decker, who also hit .429 in the sweep over Texas A&M, was the first CU player to post a double-double and hit .400 in the same match since Allie Oelke had 17 kills and 25 digs while hitting .433 against Evansville on Nov. 4, 2007.
Decker, however, became the first CU senior to have a kill-dig double-double and hit .400 in the same match since Melissa Walsh had 23 kills and 10 digs while hitting .526 against Southern Illinois on Nov. 2, 2001.

Double Trouble
Seniors Amanda Cvejdlik and Carolyn Decker have combined for 1,179 career kills and played in a combined 148 matches, but incredibly, last Saturday's match vs. Texas A&M was just the second time that both players had 10 or more kills in the same match. Cvejdlik had 11 kills and hit .400 while Decker had 13 kills and hit .429 in the victory.
The only other occurrence where both seniors had 10 or more kills in the same contest was Aug. 26, 2006 against Montana State when Cvejdlik had 11 kills and Decker finished with 18 putaways.

Nearly Unbeatable When Up 2-0
Before last Saturday's 3-2 loss to LSU, Creighton had been 56-0 under Kirsten Bernthal Booth when taking a 2-0 lead into intermission and 32-1 when leading 2-1 after three sets.
Booth's teams, however, have won four matches after trailing 0-2 and nine matches when down 1-2 in her six year tenure.

Extended Homestand
Tuesday night's match with Iowa State will be Creighton's fourth in a row at home to start the season. It's just the second time since the program's reinstatement that the team has opened with four straight at home, matching the 1996 squad.
Creighton has never played five consecutive home matches in the same season.

Eliminate The Errors
It's true for all programs, but one of the item the Bluejay coaching staff continues to focus on is the elimination of unforced errors.
Last weekend, Creighton combined for 106 errors (kill errors + set errors + serving errors + ball handling errors + block errors + receiving errors) in 11 sets.
Creighton had 10 or more errors in all six sets it lost, averaging 12.17 miscues in those lost sets.
On the other hand, in the five sets that Creighton won, it made nine errors or less each time and averaged just 6.6 errors per set.

Against Ranked Teams
Creighton is 0-30 all-time against ranked competition. Last Saturday's 3-2 loss to No. 21 LSU marked the first time the Bluejays had ever played as much as a five-game match against a ranked opponent.
Iowa State, ranked 18th in the preseason rankings, dropped out of the poll this week but are tops among those “also receiving votes”.
Creighton vs. Ranked Teams All-Time
Date Opponent Result
09/01/98 at #5 Nebraska L 0-3
09/04/98 vs. #19 Texas A&M (@Pacific) L 0-3
09/05/98 at #11 Pacific L 0-3
09/14/99 at #24 Kansas State L 0-3
10/16/99 #16 Northern Iowa L 0-3
09/08/00 at #6 Hawai'i L 0-3
10/03/00 at #1 Nebraska L 0-3
09/08/01 at #24 Santa Clara L 1-3
09/09/01 vs. #13 UC-Santa Barbara (at Santa Clara) L 0-3
09/25/01 at #1 Nebraska L 0-3
10/13/01 #16 Northern Iowa L 0-3
11/09/01 at #18 Northern Iowa L 0-3
09/06/02 vs. #13 Pacific L 0-3
09/21/02 at #7 Northern Iowa L 1-3
09/29/02 at #5 Nebraska L 0-3
10/18/02 #10 Northern Iowa L 0-3
10/04/03 at #10 Northern Iowa L 1-3
11/01/03 vs. #12 Northern Iowa L 1-3
10/10/04 vs. #5 Nebraska (North Platte, Neb.) L 0-3
09/06/05 at #24 Kansas State L 0-3
09/10/05 vs. #3 Stanford (Boulder, Colo.) L 0-3
10/11/05 at #1 Nebraska L 0-3
10/29/05 at #25 Wichita State L 1-3
09/24/06 #1 Nebraska L 1-3
08/31/07 at #1 Nebraska L 0-3
09/02/07 #18 Cal Poly L 0-3
09/15/07 at #13 Minnesota L 1-3
11/10/07 at #24 Wichita State L 0-3
08/29/08 #16 Minnesota L 0-3
08/30/08 #21 LSU L 2-3

Season Opening History
With its loss to Minnesota last Friday, Creighton fell to 7-8 in season-opening matches since restarting the program in 1994. Creighton head coach Kirsten Bernthal Booth is 3-3 in opening matches.
The Jays also dropped to 2-4 all-time in season-openers at home with the loss to the Golden Gophers.

Hello World!
Creighton has four players (Karisa Almgren, Megan Bober, Emily Crowley and Alicia Runge) that might make their Division I debut on Tuesday. True freshman Laurel Sanford was the only newcomer to debut for CU last weekend, earning two kills in two swings.
Below is the current Creighton players and how they performed in their regular-season collegiate debuts.
Since 1999, the only true freshmen to start CU's season-opener have been Brittany Coleman (2003), Carolyn Decker (2004), Korie Lebeda (2005) and Allie Oelke
Records for a Bluejay debut can be found at the bottom of page three.

ear Name GP K E TA Pct. A SA Dig TB
2004 Carolyn Decker? 3 7 6 24 .042 0 3 4 0
2005 Korie Lebeda? 3 4 0 5 .800 39 0 10 2
2007 Allie Oelke? 3 4 7 24 -.125 1 3 6 3
2008 Laurel Sanford 2 2 0 2 1.000 0 0 0 0
2005 A. Cvejdlik 2 2 0 3 .667 0 0 0 0
2005 Jessica Houts 2 2 1 4 .250 0 0 0 2
2006 Lauren Bloemke 3 1 1 6 .000 2 0 0 4
2006 Sarah Schulze 1 0 0 0 --- 0 0 0 0
2007 Melanie Feldman 2 0 0 0 --- 0 0 1 0
2007 Bianca Rivera 3 0 0 0 --- 4 0 14 0

Regular-Season Tournament History
Creighton is 42-50 in the 31 regular-season tournaments it has participated in all-time, including a 1-2 mark this year. Kirsten Bernthal Booth's teams are 26-19 in 16 regular-season tournaments, including five titles.
Creighton had won just one of 15 regular-season tournaments prior to Booth's arrival (the 2000 Iowa State Heritage Classic).

Preseason Poll
Creighton has been picked third in a preseason poll of Missouri Valley Conference coaches. Defending regular-season champion Wichita State was picked to win the league, while defending tournament champion Northern Iowa was second. Following Creighton, Missouri State and Illinois State rounded out the top half.
Eight players were also named preseason all-MVC, including Bluejay senior Korie Lebeda.

What's New?
Several rule and terminology rules will change for the 2008 season. The term “game” has now been changed to “set”. The number of points required to win sets one through four is now 25 (was 30). The fifth set is still played to 15 points. The maximum number of substitutions for each team is 12 per set (was 15).

Statistics Expected To Decline Too
With the move from 30-point sets to 25-point sets, don't be surprised to see statistics plummet nearly 20 percent as well.
To help anticipate what the rule change would do this fall, Creighton Volleyball SID Rob Anderson went through all of Creighton's matches last season and deleted each point in sets 1-4 that occurred after a team reached 25 points and led by two or more.
Creighton ended up playing 20.46 percent fewer points (form 5,500 to 4,566 points) and numbers dropped across the board with the exception of hitting percentage, which rose by a scant .001.
Listed below is how stats would have been affected had the new rules been in effect last season in regards to stats for the entire team, category leaders, and some single-match superlatives.
Team Category To 30 Pts. To 25 Pts. Diff.
Kills Per Set 16.04 13.35 -20%
Hitting Pct. .211 .212 +.001
Assists Per Set 14.82 12.33 -20%
Aces Per Set 1.41 1.21 -17%
Digs Per Set 19.78 16.59 -19%
Blocks Per Set 2.65 2.15 -17%

Indiv. Category To 30 Pts. To 25 Pts. Player
Kills Per Set 4.18 3.46 Goc
Hitting Pct. .368 .369 Goc
Assists Per Set 12.50 10.41 Lebeda
Aces Per Set 0.36 0.33 Oelke
Digs Per Set 5.78 5.03 Rivera
Blocks Per Set 0.99 0.78 Bloemke

Indiv. Superlatives 30-Pt. Matches 25-Pt. Matches
20+ Kills 8 times 3 times
24+ Kills 2 times 0 times
20+ Digs 15 times 9 times
25+ Digs 6 times 3 times
50+ Assists 7 times 1 time
40+ Assists 21 times 8 times
50+ Attempts 5 times 0 times
Double-Doubles 24 times 12 times

Taking The Fifth
Creighton is 18-5 in five-set matches under Kirsten Bernthal Booth. That's impressive since Creighton had never finished a season with a winning record in fifth sets prior to Booth's arrival.
Below is a list of Creighton's record in five-set matches on a yearly basis:
Year Set 5 W-L Total W-L
1994 0-2 5-20
1995 0-2 11-19
1996 2-6 9-19
1997 3-5 15-13
1998 2-3 7-18
1999 3-3 13-15
2000 3-3 16-12
2001 1-1 14-13
2002 1-3 3-23
2003 5-1 12-18
2004 4-0 18-11
2005 3-1 16-14
2006 4-2 21-10
2007 2-0 21-10
2008 0-1 1-2
Total 33-33 182-217

2-0 Better Than 0-2
Creighton is 115-7 (.943) all-time when leading a match 2-0, including a 57-1 mark under Kirsten Bernthal Booth. They own a 54-4 all-time mark in home matches they lead 2-0 in.
Conversely, the Jays are 6-140 (.041) all-time when trailing a match 0-2, including an 0-45 mark in those home matches. Those six comebacks from down 0-2 are listed below:
Date Opponent Games 3-5 scores Coach
09/19/97 at Bradley 15-11, 15-13, 15-8 Wallace
10/01/99 at Drake 15-6, 17-15, 15-11 Wallace
09/03/04 vs. Montana 30-20, 30-21, 15-11 Booth
10/15/04 at Bradley 30-22, 30-23, 15-11 Booth
10/15/05 at So. Illinois 30-25, 30-24, 15-8 Booth
09/21/07 at No. Iowa 31-29, 30-26, 15-12 Booth

Survival of the Fittest
Creighton has won four matches under Kirsten Bernthal Booth after surviving an opponent's match point. On the other hand, Creighton is 89-0 under Booth when it reaches a match point opportunity.
Surviving Match Points, Under Booth
Date Opponent MP(s) Faced Final Game 5
09/11/07 at Drake 13-14, 14-15 17-15
10/13/06 at Wichita State 12-14, 13-14, 14-15 17-15
10/10/03 Wichita State 13-14 16-14
08/30/03 vs. McNeese State 13-14, 15-16 18-16

Production Returning
Creighton returns 9-of-14 letterwinners from last season. Below is a breakdown of the production that returns:
Stat Returners Departures
Assists 1506 (95.0%) 80 (5.0%)
Aces 127 (84.1%) 24 (15.9%)
Digs 1704 (80.5%) 412 (19.5%)
Matches Started 138 (74.2%) 48 (25.8%)
Points 1477.5 (68.7%) 673.0 (31.3%)
Kills 1139 (66.3%) 577 (33.7%)
Blocks 159.5 (56.3%) 124 (43.7%)

Lebeda Takes A Break (Finally)
Korie Lebeda played every point of her freshman and sophomore seasons, and the first 299 points of her junior year before finally being replaced with CU owning a 26-10 lead over Montana State on Aug. 25, 2007. That brought her amazing streak to 11,849 consecutive points without a break to open her college career.
After coming out for three points, Lebeda returned for the final six points of that match. Lebeda also rested the final four points of Creighton's win over Indiana State on Sept. 29 and for five points against Indiana State on Oct. 26.
Lebeda has played every point of the 2008 season thus far as well.
Lebeda has played in 17,333 of a possible 17,345 points since coming to Creighton, good for an astounding 99.931 percent.

New Facility on the Way
Creighton broke ground on a new athletics facility on October 16, 2007, to be located just northeast of Michael G. Morrison, S.J., Stadium on the northeast corner of Webster Street and Florence Boulevard.
The Ryan Center and D. J. Sokol Arena, a 75,000 square-foot facility, will house a gymnasium seating 2,500-3,000, women's basketball and volleyball coaches' offices, locker rooms, ticket offices, athletic training and meeting rooms, media workrooms and much more.
The arena is also expected to be used for other campus and community events including campus assemblies, coaching camps/clinics, concerts, speakers and high school graduations. Creighton volleyball is expected to play there starting in 2009, hosting the MVC Tournament that November.

Fall 2007 Summary
Creighton's 2007 season featured the squad's second consecutive 21-10 record. Despite a tie for second-place in the Missouri Valley Conference with a 14-4 league mark, the Jays were not one of four league teams selected to the NCAA's.
Kelly Goc wrapped up an outstanding career by earning honorable-mention All-American honors, while setter Korie Lebeda was named first-team all-MVC. Other key contributors included MVC Freshman of the Year Allie Oelke and record-setting libero Bianca Rivera.

Game 1 Result = Match Result
In its last 72 matches in which it wins game one, Creighton is 65-7. CU is 72-11 overall under Kirsten Bernthal Booth when they win game one. In that same time span, CU is just 17-54 under Booth when it drops the first game.

Preseason MVC Poll
Creighton was picked third in the 2008 MVC preseason coaches poll. Wichita State (91 points, four first-place votes) was favored to win its second straight title, just ahead of Northern Iowa (84, two) and Creighton (81, three). Rounding out the rest of the league was Missouri State (73, one), Illinois State (67), Southern Illinois (52), Evansville (34), Drake (31), Bradley (25) and Indiana State (12).
Each of the past five years Creighton has finished in the spot predicted of them or better in the preseason poll.
Year Preseason Pick Finish Move
1994 11th 9th #2
1995 9th 7th #2
1996 9th 6th #3
1997 8th 3rd #5
1998 6th 8th i2
1999 T-7th 5th #2
2000 4th T-4th - -
2001 2nd 4th i2
2002 7th 9th i2
2003 9th T-5th #4
2004 5th 5th - -
2005 5th 5th - -
2006 4th 4th - -
2007 3rd T-2nd #1
2008 3rd ??? ???

AVCA Honors CU Volleyball For Academics
The Creighton volleyball program was honored by the American Volleyball Coaches Association as a recipient of the 2008 AVCA Team Academic Award. Creighton previously won the award in 1998, 1999, 2004, 2005, 2006 and 2007 and are one of 10 Division I schools nationwide to win the award in five consecutive campaigns.
The award honors teams that displayed excellence in the classroom by maintaining at least a 3.30 cumulative GPA. Last spring the Bluejay volleyball team posted a cumulative GPA of 3.31.

Radio Broadcast Information
Brad Burwell and Erin Swanson will broadcast at least 22 regular-season matches this season on KVSS (88.9 FM), as well as any potential MVC Tournament and NCAA Tournament matches. The matches will also be streamed on-line at www.kvss.com. A complete list of remaining matches follows:
2008 Volleyball Broadcast Schedule
Sept. 2 Iowa State
Sept. 12 vs. Rice
Sept. 13 vs. Oklahoma
Sept. 13 at Stephen F. Austin
Sept. 19 at Bradley
Sept. 20 at Northern Iowa
Sept. 26 Missouri State
Sept. 27 Wichita State
Oct. 3 Drake
Oct. 5 Nebraska
Oct. 17 Evansville
Oct. 18 Southern Illinois
Oct. 24 at Wichita State
Oct. 25 at Missouri State
Oct. 31 at Drake
Nov. 7 Indiana State
Nov. 8 Illinois State
Nov. 21 Northern Iowa
Nov. 22 Bradley
Nov. 27-29 at MVC Tournament
Dec. 4-20 at NCAA Tournament

Creighton Ticket Information
Tickets to Creighton's home regular-season matches are sold at all Ticketmaster outlets. Cost is $7 for adults and $4 for youth (18 years of age or younger) with children five and under admitted free. Season ticket information is available online at www.gocreighton.com or by calling (402) 280-JAYS. Creighton has sold approximately 490 season tickets for volleyball this year after selling 380 season tickets last year. (14 kills, 10 blocks, .400) and (2007). All four of those women went on to earn a spot on the MVC's All-Freshman team.

Players Mentioned

Amanda Cvejdlik

Carolyn Decker

Kelly Goc

Jessica Houts

Korie Lebeda

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