Big Ten volleyball title chase intensifies as Gophers face Wisconsin on Sunday

There is nowhere to hide in the race for the Big Ten volleyball championship.

With one week left in the regular season, six teams are within three games of each other for the conference crown.

"I think anybody that says they're not trying to win a Big Ten title is lying through their teeth," said Wisconsin coach Kelly Sheffield. "It's so hard to do. This may be the hardest year to do it."

Entering Saturday, Nebraska and Wisconsin were atop the conference at 14-3 in Big Ten play. The Gophers and Purdue were right behind at 13-4, followed by Penn State and Ohio State (12-5).

In the latest AVCA rankings, all six of those Big Ten teams were ranked in the top 15 in the country — the next highest conference total was the ACC with three. The top teams are jostling for position in the NCAA tournament, with the field set to be announced Nov. 28.

Sheffield and the Badgers come to Maturi Pavilion on Sunday to face the Gophers in one of the most highly anticipated matches of the season. But it's just another in a string of crucial contests across the conference.

Over the next week, those six teams in the title race will face each other six times. The Gophers have two of those matchups. They have played well enough of late to put themselves in a position to fight for the title, which they last won in 2018.

The Gophers have won six of their past seven during a stretch that featured six matches against teams in the Top 25 and four against teams in the Top 10.

Coach Hugh McCutcheon said one reason the Gophers were OK with a strenuous non-conference schedule — five of their first six matches this season came against opponents ranked in the top 15, including No. 1 Texas and No. 5 Florida — was the belief that it could help prepare for this conference schedule.

"Some of the adversity we got into August and September afforded us the opportunity to learn some tough lessons," he said. "It's important that you learn those lessons. It's pay me now or pay me later. At some point you have to pay."

Sheffield said one of the joys of playing in this conference is that in some ways you're always paying up. The Badgers and Gophers did that last weekend when they both lost to Purdue in four sets.

"One thing about this league, every time you're playing, you're playing the coaches and players that can execute things," Sheffield said. "Every time you go out and play there are things that are being exposed."

In the Big Ten, getting exposed is just part of the deal. This weekend, Wisconsin and Minnesota share the stage. The lights are only getting brighter.