Terps win in a gritty battle, moving to 1-2 in Big Ten play, in a 3-2 result against Iowa.

Photo by Hana Kaufman/Maryland Terrapins. Photo courtesy of Maryland Athletics.

“Just having the right mindset, and you know, in some of the early-season matches, we know we’re playing some non-power-four teams, and I thought we did a good job reminding ourselves where we ended up; we’re proving everybody wrong,” head coach Adam Hudges said. 

Freshman BrooklynneBrass struggled in the first few Big Ten games, with 10 digs, 13 kills, and a negative hitting percentage against Indiana. 

Brass responded in great fashion, coming out and opening the scoring for the Terps. Bryant returned to action with the score at 4-5 after being out with an injury for the previous two games. 

Iowa was riddled with attacking errors throughout the set, with seven; the winning point came off an attacking error to make it 1-0. 

The Terps started the second set out close at 4-6, but the Hawkeyes went on a 7-0 scoring run to take a 12-6 lead. By the media timeout, it was 9-15, looking the Hawkeyes’ way, and it remained that way. 

At one point, they were hitting .800% with the score at 10-18. A service ace gave the Hawkeyes the win for the set, with the final score being 13-25. 

The Terps flipped the offensive trouble that the Hawkeyes had in the first set with seven attacking errors. 

The third set was a back-and-forth between both teams, with over nine ties between both teams before the first media timeout. Maryland led 15-14 by the break. Senior Eva Rohrbach had five kills throughout the set, including the game-winning point to win the set 25-22. 

The fourth set was the same as the third, with it being a gritty battle throughout; Brown had throughout the first eight points with three kills. At the first media break, the Terps were down only three, with the score being 12-15. The Hawkeyes would go on a 4-0 scoring run to make it 16-23. The Terps tried to get back in it, but it was too little, too late, with Iowa winning 19-25. 

Brown looked to get the scoring going in the final set with a kill. Rohrbach laid it over the net with a soft touch for the point to make it 8-5. Brass wins it with the final point of the match. The Terps win 15-10. 

“Every time we’re in the huddle or getting back on the bench, we’re hyping each other up, and we know what we could do. We do it every day in practice. So just having each other really just kept us going,” said Brass. 

Brass finished with 18 kills, 9 digs, and 19.5 points; Brown had 18 kills, 7 digs, and 19.5 points. 

Bryant’s return was a difference-maker, providing much-needed offense for the Terps with 11 kills and 12.5 points. 

The Terps move to 1-2 in Big Ten Conference play. Maryland will now face off against No. 1 Nebraska on Saturday, Oct. 3, at 7:00 p.m.