PISCATAWAY, N.J. – Rutgers volleyball is back home to begin a four-game homestand with Maryland on Friday, Oct. 3 at 7 p.m. and Nebraska on Saturday, Oct. 4 at 7 p.m.
Friday's match with the Terrapins is the first of five matches for the Scarlet Knights in the newly created Discover In-Season Volleyball Challenge.
No general public tickets remain for Saturday's match with the Cornhuskers; however, fans can still purchase tickets through SeatGeek, the official ticket marketplace of the Rutgers Scarlet Knights, by clicking
here.
- No general public tickets remain for the Saturday, Oct. 4 Rutgers volleyball match with Nebraska at 7 p.m. at Jersey Mike's Arena.
- Fans can still purchase tickets thru SeatGeek, the official ticket marketplace of the Rutgers Scarlet Knights, by clicking here.
Due to the anticipated high volume of traffic around Jersey Mike's Arena on Nebraska match day, Rutgers Athletics will implement the traffic pattern below beginning at approximately 6 p.m. on Saturday.
- Traffic turning onto Hospital Road from Ave E will be advised to create two lanes for access to the Green and Yellow Lots.
- Hospital Road will be closed at Suttons Lane, with signage directing visitors to Rockafeller Road to access the Green and Yellow Lots.
- After the match, Hospital Road will be split, as exiting traffic will be sent toward Ave. E and Suttons Lane. Traffic exiting from the Yellow Lot to Rockafeller Road will be permitted to go left or right.
- Both games will be a SCARLET OUT with red Block R shirts available at the door while supplies last.
- Additionally, the team will be on the concourse following both matches for autographs.
- On Saturday, the Rutgers Game Set Match Fun Zone and Beer Garden with free family-friendly games and activities will be open from 5 – 7 p.m. in front of Jersey Mike's Arena. Free food will be available for Rutgers students while supplies last. Food and beverage will also be available for purchase.
- Friday night's match with the Terrapins will be the first of five matches for the Scarlet Knights in the newly created Discover In-Season Volleyball Challenge. Other contests in the challenge this season included Northwestern, the return date at Maryland, at Penn State and at Ohio State.
- No general public tickets remain for Saturday's match with the Cornhuskers. Fans can still purchase tickets thru SeatGeek, the official ticket marketplace of the Rutgers Scarlet Knights.
- The Scarlet Knights are coming off a pair of Big Ten road games opening the season with a 17-25, 17-25, 12-25 setback at No. 7 Wisconsin to open the conference slate and a 22-25, 13-25, 27-29 loss at No. 11 Minnesota.
- Rutgers concluded the nonconference portion of its schedule with a 9-3 mark with seven sweeps and a seven-match win streak, the longest since 2012.
- Entering conference play, RU leads the Big Ten in aces per set (2.21) and ranks ninth nationally, led by Lexi Visintine's 27 on the year, averaging a league-best 0.56. Most recently, the Scarlet Knights served up 11 last Tuesday night in its 3-0 victory over Columbia to end nonconference play with Visintine and Aspen Maxwell each serving up a trio. With 82 aces in her career, Visintine is one ace away from cracking the Rutgers rally-era career top five.
- Aspen Maxwell, who has picked up two all-tournament nods this nonconference season, including being named the Sacred Heart Invite MVP, is second in the Big Ten with 241.5 points and is third in total kills (202) and fourth in kills per set (4.21). She has collected double-figure kills in all but two matches this season.
- Lily Bolen is adding 10.42 assists per frame and is 22nd nationally and sixthh among Big Ten setters in the category. She has collected three double-doubles this season in matches with Marist, Liberty and LIU.
- Zora Hardison leads RU with the stops at the net with 56 total blocks, including 21 solo stops. She is currently tied for the rally-era season solo blocks record set by former teammate Kristina Grkovic in 2023. Grkovic also holds the career record with 43 solo rejections from 2020-23, which Hardison is closing in on with 41 in her third season of action.
- Alleigh Dutton has led RU in digs in all 14 matches to date and averages 3.40 per set.
- The Terrapins enter Friday night's match at 7-5 overall and looking to pick up their first conference win after opening Big Ten play last week with 3-0 losses on the road at Iowa and No. 1 Nebraska.
- Ajack Maluai leads the attack at 3.48 k/s and has also put up a team-leading 25 aces. Lilly Wagner is posting 8.26 a/s set to set up the offense.
- On the block, both Duru Gokcen and Eva Rohrbach lead Maryland with 60 total blocks, averaging 1.30 per set. Digging up the defense is Ally Williams at 3.43 d/s and Lilly Wagner at 2.26 d/s.
- The top-ranked Cornhuskers check in this week at 12-0, joining Texas as the only undefeated DI volleyball teams in the country, following straight-set Big Ten opening wins at home against Michigan and Nebraska. Nebraska will meet No. 16 Penn State on Friday night before making the trip to Jersey Mike's Arena.
- On the stat sheet, Harper Murray is firing away at 3.41 k/s to go along with her team-leading 10 aces. Bergen Reilly, meanwhile, directs the attack with 9.59 a/s and leads Nebraska at 3.00 d/s.
- Rebekah Allick is at the net to lead the Cornhusker wall with 45 total stops to average 1.22 per frame. Olivia Mauch sits behind Reilly in digs with 2.79 per set.
- The Big Ten Conference and Big Ten Network (BTN) announced the launch of a newly created In-Season Volleyball Challenge. Partnering with Discover®, the official credit card of the Big Ten Conference, the inaugural Discover In-Season Volleyball Challenge will debut during the 2025 regular season conference schedule, starting Oct. 1, encompassing all 18 Big Ten Volleyball programs.
- Select conference matches played during the month of October will count toward the Discover In-Season Volleyball Challenge. Each team will play five designated challenge matches throughout the month, with the winner determined by the highest win total across the five games.
2025 Rutgers Discover In-Season Volleyball Challenge Schedule:
| Friday |
Oct. 3 |
vs. Maryland |
7:00 p.m. |
B1G+ |
| Friday |
Oct. 10 |
vs. Northwestern |
7:00 p.m. |
B1G+ |
| Wednesday |
Oct. 15 |
at Maryland |
7:00 p.m. |
BTN |
| Friday |
Oct. 24 |
at Penn State |
7:00 p.m. |
B1G+ |
| Friday |
Oct. 31 |
at Ohio State |
6:00 p.m. |
B1G+ |
- Zora Hardison is coming close to becoming RU's career and rally-era season solo blocks leader. With 41 career solo blocks, she needs three more to surpass former teammate Kristina Grkovic (2020-23) as the rally-era career leader. With one more solo stops, Hardison will overtake Grkovic's rally-era season record of 21 set back in 2023. The junior middle is also 19 total blocks away from joining the RU career top 10 list and currently has 187 under her belt in her three seasons. Sophomore Natalie Robinson is on her heels with 150 career blocks.
- Lexi Visintine has served up 82 career aces and needs one more to move into a tie for fifth on the rally-era career leaders list with Karysa Swackenberg (2016-19).
- Lily Bolen has racked up 783 career helpers and is 44 assists away from moving into seventh on the rally-era career leaders list past Talia Holze (2014-17).
- Rutgers won a stretch of seven straight, marking the longest win streak for the program since 2012. During the streak, RU captured sweeps in six of the seven contests, including four consecutive 3-0 victories, the longest streak of sweeps since 2012.
- During RU's win streak, Aspen Maxwell blasted away 4.41 k/s while hitting .361 on her 97 total kills, adding 11 aces, 1.50 d/s, and 16 total blocks, and Tara Garvey put away 68 kills to average 3.09 k/s.
- Zora Hardison was at the net for 31 stops, including 11 solo blocks, averaging 1.48 blocks per frame. She also hit .363 with 41 kills, averaging 1.95 per set.
- Natalie Robinson was also on the block for 13 blocks while contributing 1.77 k/s and swinging at a .372 clip.
- In addition to Maxwell, Lexi Visintine and Lily Bolen were also in double-figure aces. Visintine served up 15 with Bolen amassing 13.
- Bolen averaged 10.68 assists per set, helping RU to average 14.05 kills per frame and swing .336 across the streak. She also came up with 2.23 d/s.
- Alleigh Dutton continued to be steady for the defense picking up 3.64 d/s.
- Opening weekend Aspen Maxwell was named to the Buffalo Invite All-Tournament Team after averaging 3.93 kills and adding nine blocks across 14 sets. In her RU debut, Maxwell hit .346 with 14 kills and four blocks in the victory over Marist. She followed up with 20 kills and 12 digs for her first career double-double to go along with four blocks in a five-set match with Liberty and added a career-high 21 kills with Buffalo.
- Maxwell, the following week, was named the Sacred Heart Invitational MVP after averaging 4.20 k/s with a .363 attack percentage along with seven aces, 1.60 d/s and eight blocks. In a sweep of Dartmouth to kick off the weekend, she captured a match-high 16 kills and hit .500 while also contributing two aces, two blocks and seven digs. Maxwell's 16 kills tied for the fifth most kills by a Scarlet Knight in a three-set match, while her efficiency on the attack helped RU hit .348. Additionally, her 19.0 points marked by sixth-most by an RU player in a three-set match of the rally era. Maxwell followed up with nine kills and a career-high five blocks as RU made it back-to-back sweeps in its win over host Sacred Heart. The right side ended the weekend with a match-best 17 kills, swinging .367, with a career-high four aces and eight digs as the Scarlet Knights wrapped up the weekend with a 3-1 win over NEC favorite LIU.
- Lily Bolen also made an appearance on the Sacred Heart All-Tournament Team, having averaged 9.60 a/s, 2.70 d/s and six aces. In a sweep of Dartmouth to kick off the weekend, she put up 29 helpers and narrowly missed a double-double with nine digs and helped direct the attack to hit .348. Bolen followed up with 26 assists, eight digs and a block as RU made it back-to-back sweeps in its win over host Sacred Heart. The setter ended the weekend with her third double-double of the season with 41 assists and 10 digs to go along with a block as the Scarlet Knights wrapped up the weekend with a 3-1 win over NEC favorite LIU.
- In Caitlin Schweihofer's first season, played in the spring of 2021 due to COVID-19, the Scarlet Knights tripled its conference win total en route to capturing numerous program firsts. Among the team's firsts were its first-ever All-Big Ten honoree and Big Ten series sweeps. The Scarlet Knights won their first-ever Big Ten home opener, earned victories over Indiana and Michigan State for the first time in history, captured two series sweeps against Maryland and Michigan State, picked up set victories against No. 4 Nebraska and No. 10 Purdue and pushed No. 19 Ohio State to five sets and match point. RU established new team, season and match records for aces and reset program Big Ten game bests in kills, attempts, attack percentage and assists, as well as individual conference superlatives in attack percentage, assists and digs.
- Returning to fall ball for the 2021 season only three and a half months after the conclusion of the Big Ten-only 2020 season, Rutgers continued to make strides going 8-3 for its best nonconference record since 2012. During the season the Scarlet Knights battled eight Top 25 teams during Big Ten play, a conference that sent eight teams to the NCAA Tournament, including the year's national champion. Rutgers captured set wins over No. 8 Purdue and No. 15 Penn State and took Illinois to five sets in front of a national audience on BTN. Inna Balyko wrapped up her career fifth all-time in assists and ninth all-time in block assists, while Kamila Cieslik became the rally era leader in matches played (132) and Beka Kojadinovic concluded her career as the rally era leader in aces.
- More success continued in 2022 as the Scarlet Knights opened the year at 3-0 for the first time since 1998 and battled eight Top 25 teams during Big Ten play and eight teams that advanced to the 2022 NCAA Tournament. During the nonconference schedule, four Scarlet Knights were named to All-Tournament squads while altogether Rutgers had 11 entries among the rally-era season leaders list.
- Another step up the ladder occurred in 2023 as the Scarlet Knights earned their first-ever All-Big Ten attacker, captured their first-ever top 25 victory, collected the most overall wins and best nonconference record since 2012, improved set wins by 45% over the previous season and set a school record in attendance. RU placed 12 entries into the rally-era individual season top 10 records and 13 entries into the rally-era team top 10 records while collecting the most sets played, kills, assists, assists per set, digs and solo blocks by a team in conference play since joining the Big Ten in 2014.
- Last season, a youthful Scarlet Knight squad continued to rewrite the Rutgers record book, putting up several notable career and season numbers as the Big Ten expanded to the West Coast. On the attack, Alissa Kinkela, the squad's first-ever All-Big Ten attacker from 2023 and an Australian Olympic hopeful, cracked the top 10 all-time in career kills, the second most rally-era career kills and the third most rally-era career kills per set. Following the season, Kinkela signed to play professionally in South Korea. In addition to Kinkela's mark in the record book, Rutgers put nine entries into the rally-era individual season top 10 records, with a new benchmark set for blocks in a rally-era season from rookie Natalie Robinson. Additionally, Robinson leads RU's career blocks per set category after only one season "On The Banks". At the same time, junior Lexi Visintine was just two aces shy of setting a new season standard in the category.
- Rutgers volleyball's homestand continues with Northwestern on Friday, Oct. 10 and Illinois on Saturday, Oct. 11. Both matches will serve up action at 7 p.m.
- At next Saturday's match with the Wildcats, all fans are encouraged to wear PINK to support Breast Cancer Awareness. First 250 fans will receive a pink Block R shirt.
- Click here to purchase tickets.
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