Wisconsin volleyball sweeps Michigan, but loses Charlie Fuerbringer to injury

MADISON — With 31 ties and 11 lead changes, Wisconsin did not always have an easy time against Michigan.

But the Badgers did enough in all three sets to win their 10th consecutive match in a volleyball sweep over Michigan (25-22, 25-22, 25-20) — their ninth sweep in the last 10 matches — on Oct. 5 at the UW Field House.

Here are three takeaways, including a key injury, from the Badgers’ win:

Charlie Fuerbringer exits with what appears to be a shoulder injury

The Michigan match was particularly challenging given the Badgers’ early injury misfortune.

Wisconsin setter Charlie Fuerbringer, a 2024 third-team All-American, exited the match early and went to the locker room with what appeared to be a shoulder injury. It happened as she went up for a joust at the net with Michigan’s Serena Nyambio. She immediately grabbed her shoulder after the joust.

She returned to the bench later in the first set with ice on her right shoulder and her arm in a sling and remained on the sideline with her teammates for the rest of the match.

Fuerbringer had been thriving this season, ranking second nationally and first in the Big ten with 11.47 assists per set. Wisconsin coach Kelly Sheffield said after the match it was too early to have any details on her injury status.

"It's why you got an elite medical team and all those things,” Sheffield said. “So I'm sure they'll get us some answers here in probably the next couple days hopefully."

The Badgers are already without Grace Egan, who had been starting at right-side hitter. Sheffield told the Journal Sentinel on Sept. 28 that Egan will “probably be out for a couple weeks.”

“We have something called adversity school, and it’s, ‘What are you, what is your mentality when things don’t go your way or you’ve got a little bit of adversity in front of you?’” Sheffield said after the Oct. 5 match. “Obviously our All-American setter going down early in that match — there’s an opportunity that is in front of, ‘How do you respond in those types of situations?’ … We did a great job of staying the course and just playing volleyball — doing what we know.”

Booth, UW’s other team captain alongside Fuerbringer, attributed that resilience to “age and maturity.”

“It’s not the first time I’ve seen a starter go down,” Booth said. “So my mind immediately just went to, ‘How can I boost up whoever’s going in?’ … Yeah, it sucks, and we’ll address it in the next few days, but it’s not something that honestly I could give a lot of thought or brain power to because my focus was on Addy (Horner), who was going in to this situation to help us win this match.”

Addy Horner impresses after replacing Charlie Fuerbringer

As Fuerbringer exited the match, Booth had a message for Horner — a freshman who appeared in 16 sets in the Badgers’ first 11 matches of the season.

“Excuse my French, but I said, ‘You run a damn good offense, and you’re a hell of a blocker,’” Booth said.

Horner showed exactly that for the rest of the match, racking up 35 assists with only one setting error. She orchestrated an offense that overall hit .356 in the match, which was above UW’s .331 hitting percentage through the first 11 matches.

“To come back and still win that first set, I think, is a testament to the fact that she was ready to go and that we didn’t take long to get into our rhythm again,” Booth said.

Horner, Sheffield said, is “unflappable.”

“Addy doesn’t need to be Charlie; that would be unfair to her,” Sheffield said. “But there are some things that she does that other setters aren’t able to do. So she needs to be the best her. … It wasn’t a perfect match. We wouldn’t have gotten a perfect one out of Charlie. But it was a really good match for her, and really proud of her and her ability to move on to the next play. … She does an elite job of just moving on to the next play, and that’s what you need out of that position.”

She also contributed to the Badgers’ win in other ways, including her serving. She had two service aces and other serves that did enough to put the Wolverines in difficult positions to score.

“She’s got a wicked serve,” UW middle blocker Alicia Andrew said. “She does a heck of a lot of damage behind the service line, too. … I was just super impressed by her serve and then how she was running the offense.”

Mimi Colyer delivers again in elite way

Mimi Colyer has been elite throughout the season, finishing each match with at least 10 kills and had at least 15 kills in three of the Badgers’ previous four matches.

The Oregon transfer delivered again amid the team’s adverse circumstances, picking up 23 kills while hitting .538.

“Those are nasty numbers,” Sheffield said. “She hit well in system. She hit well out of system. She mixed her shots up. It wasn’t just her going after one area of the court. I thought she was using great vision and playing with courage. And passed well enough where we kept our team in system.”

Colyer also had success with serve-receive, as she received 29 of Michigan’s serves without any reception errors.

“It was an unbelievable match for her, but really as good of a match that it was for her, it was just an elite match for our entire team,” Sheffield said. “Because we don’t win that match if our team isn’t this — isn’t a closed fist and tight — and that’s the big takeaway from today.”

This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Wisconsin sweeps Michigan, but loses Charlie Fuerbringer to injury