Historic match
Untiedt and Louisville to play for NCAA volleyball title
Heron Lake-Okabena graduate Sam Untiedt serves for Louisville earlier this season. Photo by University of Louisville.
A Heron Lake-Okabena graduate is a member of one of the teams that will play in a history-making title match in the NCAA Volleyball Championships today (Sunday) at the KFC Yum! Center in Louisville.
Sam Untiedt is a 5-foot-8 freshman libero-defensive specialist for Louisville, which will play Penn State for the national title at 2 p.m. Minnesota time. The match will be televised on ABC.
Either Louisville’s Dani Busboom Kelly or Penn State’s Katie Schumacher-Cawley will become the first female volleyball head coach to win a national championship.
And only four teams have won an NCAA volleyball championship in its home arena.
The last team to accomplish the feat was Nebraska in 2006, a team that Busboom Kelly was a member of and compiled a 33-1 record. The other teams are 1984 UCLA (33-6), 1986 Pacific (39-3) and 1991 UCLA (31-5).
More on the coaches later.
According to The Globe of Worthington, Untiedt had committed to South Dakota State, but later decommitted to weigh her options.
Sam and her family reached out to Louisville associate head coach Dan Meske, who they knew from his time as the head coach at Augustana University. He coached the Vikings in the 2016 and 2017 seasons.
Meske and the Cardinals decided that Untiedt was worth pursuing and the three-time all-Red Rock Conference and one-time Class 1A all-state player for the Heron Lake-Okabena/Fulda Coyotes eventually headed south. Untiedt also earned academic all-state honors.
Untiedt has played in 13 sets in nine matches for Louisville as a freshman. She had two service aces in a match vs. Northern Kentucky and one vs. Notre Dame.
Untiedt also played for the Cardinals in their match against South Dakota and Jackson County Central graduate Alaina Wolff in September.
Louisville’s Busboom Kelly is coaching in her second national championship match in three years and is aiming to bring home the championship trophy for Louisville.
When asked what it means to be a part of history Sunday, Busboom Kelly told The Associated Press: “It's hard to really just put that in words. I think it's more of a feeling. It's more like just being really proud that we can be the role models and hopefully blaze a new trail and show ADs that women can do it. We can be moms, and we can be high-level coaches.
"It's going to be awesome for the sport, I think, to get this monkey off its back and move on from this, where it's not historic that a woman wins, it's just a regular thing. It will be great when every Final Four there's a chance for a woman to win it.”
Untiedt’s position coach at Louisville is Prior Lake graduate CC McGraw.
As a freshman in high school with the Lakers, McGraw played on a Prior Lake team that played in Jackson and won the tournament that is now known as the Carolyn Hummel Invitational, beating Sioux Falls O’Gorman in the finals.
McGraw went on to the University of Minnesota where she was a two-time first team all-Big 10 selection and was a second-team choice once.
Louisville lost the first set to Pittsburgh in the national semifinals Thursday before coming back to beat the Panthers 3-1.
Penn State won in five sets over Big 10 rival Nebraska on Thursday.
The Nittany Lions were down early in the match, falling behind 2-0 but engineered the reverse sweep and moved to 5-0 in five-setters this season.
The semifinal thrillers were played before a NCAA-record crowd of 21,726.
The Nittany Lions, who enter today’s match with a 34-2 record, swept Louisville (30-5) in University Park, Penn. in September.
Fun fact
Sam Untiedt is the second graduate of a Jackson County school to play for an NCAA volleyball championship at any level in Louisville.
The first?
2012 Jackson County Central graduate Whitney (Burmeister) Larson, who was a junior libero with Southwest Minnesota State when it lost to Tampa in the NCAA Division II championship match at Bellarmine University in Louisville.
Whitney was named to the all-tournament team at the national tournament.
National champions
Winners of the NCAA Volleyball Championship. Listed are year, team and won-loss record in parenthesis.
2023: Texas (28-4)
2022: Texas (28-1)
2021: Wisconsin (31-3)
2020: Kentucky (24-1)
2019: Stanford (30-4)
2018: Stanford (34-1)
2017: Nebraska (32-4)
2016: Stanford (26-7)
2015: Nebraska (32-4)
2014: Penn State (36-3)
2013: Penn State (34-2)
2012: Texas (29-4)
2011: UCLA (29-6)
2010: Penn State (32-5)
2009: Penn State (38-0)
2008: Penn State (38-0)
2007: Penn State (34-2)
2006: Nebraska (33-1)
2005: Washington (32-1)
2004: Stanford (30-6)
2003: Southern California (35-0)
2002: Southern California (31-1)
2001: Stanford (33-2)
2000: Nebraska (34-0)
1999: Penn State (36-1)
1998: Long Beach State (36-0)
1997: Stanford (33-2)
1996: Stanford (31-2)
1995: Nebraska (32-1)
1994: Stanford (31-2)
1993: Long Beach State (32-2)
1992: Stanford (31-2)
1991: UCLA (31-5)
1990: UCLA (36-1)
1989: Long Beach State (32-5)
1988: Texas (34-5)
1987: Hawaii (37-2)
1986: Pacific (39-3)
1985: Pacific (36-3)
1984: UCLA (33-6)
1983: Hawaii (34-2)
1982: Hawaii (33-1)
1981: Southern California (27-10)
SOURCES: NCAA, University of Louisville, Louisville Courier-Journal, Southwest Minnesota State University, The Globe of Worthington, and The Associated Press.