Hoosiers travelling to face top-ranked team

After losing in a two-game home stand for the first time since Nov. 20 and 21, 2009, the IU women’s volleyball team has used this week of practice to focus on fighting for victories.

“It’s something we’ve been working on and will continue to work on because if we don’t fight, we are going to get beat a lot,” outside hitter Ivie Obeime said.

The Hoosiers will have to bring the fight from the practice court to the road. The team travels to Champaign-Urbana, Ill., to take on the No. 1 Fighting Illini.

Obeime, a junior from Carmel, Ind., is coming from one of her best weekends of the season, racking up 21 kills total, including 15 kills Saturday night against Michigan State. Currently, Obeime ranks second on the team in both kills (121) and kills per set average (2.33).

The junior said getting swept at home last weekend was a wake-up call for the veterans that need to lead the less-experienced players. She said there will be no easy wins in the Big Ten.

“We are starting to realize (we need to fight) and the young girls are realizing that, and we need to make a few changes,” Obeime said. “That’s (the veterans’) job to help lead the team and the younger girls who don’t have the experience.”

Freshman middle blocker Morgan Leach, who grew up and lived in Champaign, Ill., said she looks forward to a big game in her homecoming against the Fighting Illini.

After attending a number of games in Illinois’s Huff Hall, Leach said she doesn’t know what to expect in her first game as a Hoosier in her hometown.

“I think it will be a little different,” Leach said. “It will be kind of weird, because I am used to going to games at Huff. I’ve been there so many times, but I am excited to get there and play.”

IU Coach Sherry Dunbar said she hopes Leach — like all her players — embraces traveling to a tough Big Ten road environment that happens to be her hometown.

“Everyone wonders how it is going to be the first time you go home and play, and literally, she is going home to Champaign,” Dunbar said. “We will see how she handles that pressure and that environment going on the road in the Big Ten for the first time.”

After Friday’s game against the Illini, the Hoosiers will travel north to Evanston, Ill., on Saturday to complete the weekend trip against Northwestern.

Like Leach, the match against Northwestern will provide middle blocker Samantha Thrower, who came from Sycamore, Ill., the chance to play in front of her friends and family from home.

Thrower said the team is ready to compete during its first Big Ten road trip.

“I always love playing Illinois and Northwestern because all my family and extended family get to see me play,” Thrower said. “As a team, we are all coming in early doing extra work and getting extra reps because we want to do well this year. We are ready to compete.”