Storylines for the SIU Match
1) Missouri State (11-18, 5-12 Missouri Valley Conference) closes out the regular season at 4 p.m. Wednesday against Southern Illinois (10-18, 3-14) at Hammons Student Center. The Bears need a win and an Evansville loss to Indiana State to qualify for the MVC Tournament.
2) MSU holds a 60-26 lead over Southern Illinois and is 34-9 against the Salukis in Springfield. SIU has won the last five meetings overall.
The MoState-SIU coaching matchup features a combined 1,372 victories on the sideline, with MSU's
Steven McRoberts ranking 11th among active Division I coaches with 655 victories, and SIU's Ed Allen ranking seventh with 717 wins. McRoberts, who succeeded Allen as head coach at Tulsa in 2011, owns a 12-6 record in head-to-head meetings, including a 4-5 mark in MSU-SIU matchups.
3) Missouri State is in the top 13 nationally in five statistical categories. The Bears rank fourth in total digs (2,023), 13th in digs per set (17.44), fifth in total attacks (4,379), 12th in total assists (1,411) and 11th in total kills (1,519).
4) MSU has three senior starters from the same recruiting class -
Maddy Bushnell,
Kate Owen and
Morgan Sprague - who have already stamped their names on the record book.
Bushnell set MSU's freshman record with a .343 hitting percentage in 2021, and currently ranks 12th in school history with a .284 attack efficiency for her career.
Owen ranks seventh at MSU with 1,484 career digs, while her 81 matches with 10 or more digs rank fifth at MoState.
Sprague sits third in MSU history in career assists with 3,955 and ranks 15th with 1,237 digs as one of three Bears with 3,000 assists and 1,000 digs in a career. She also ranks eighth at MSU with 60 career matches with 10-plus digs.
5) A pair of freshman outside hitters have made an immediate impact for the Bears.
Aniya Joseph leads all MVC freshmen with a 3.56 kill average, while Finley leads the league's rookies with 342 total kills, good for fourth all-time among MSU freshmen.
Joseph won MVC Freshman of the Week in each of the first two weeks of the year, and became the sixth player in league history to claim that award and Player of the Week in the same week on Sept. 9. She reached 100 kills in MSU's seventh match of the year, the quickest for a freshman in school history. Lily Johnson reached 100 in her eighth match. Joseph is also the only MSU freshman on record (since 1987) to debut with a 20-kill match.
Rilynn Finley was the MVC's Freshman of the Week on Nov. 4 and is the only Bears freshman on record to begin a career with three consecutive double-figure kill matches and got to 100 in her ninth career match.
6) MSU has ranked in the top 32 nationally in total digs in three of the last four seasons, finishing 10th in 2020-21, 11th in 2023 and 32nd in 2022. So far in 2024, the Bears rank fourth in the nation with 2,023 total digs and 13th with a 17.44 per set average.
7) MoState has notched the top five ace averages since the 25-point scoring era began in the last five seasons, with at least 1.20 per set in each season under Coach McRoberts.
The Bears have served double-digit ace totals 20 times in the last five seasons.
8) Head coach
Steven McRoberts is in his fifth season in Springfield and 28th overall as a head coach with 655 victories to his credit, good for 11th among active Division I coaches.
