Pitt To Host Duke, No. 20 UNC In Crucial Weekend Slate

PITTSBURGH - No. 2 Pitt, now 21-1 overall, hosts Duke Friday at 7:00 p.m. and No. 20 North Carolina Sunday at 1:00 p.m. Pitt and UNC are tied for second in the ACC standings with identical 11-1 marks heading into the weekend. Both matches will be streamed on ACC Network Extra.

Duke enters the weekend at 16-6 on the season and 8-4 in ACC play. The Blue Devils are 7-2 on the road this year and succeeds with a powerful offense that ranks No. 24 in efficiency (.267 hitting percentage) and No. 26 in kills (13.80 per set). Nikki Quinn leads the ACC with 10.73 assists per set and Nataly Moravec brings the power, ranking first in the conference in attacks per set at 11.49.

North Carolina enters the weekend tied with Pitt for second place in the ACC standings with an 11-1 mark to go with a 16-4 overall record. The match-up will feature two of the best blocking teams in the country (Pitt is No. 1) as the Tar Heels are No. 3 nationally at 3.08 blocks per set. Opponents are hitting just .159 against North Carolina, a big test for Pitt's No. 2 ranked offense with a .333 hitting percentage.

FISHING FOR WINS

Pitt Head Coach Dan Fisher has spent more than a decade reeling in wins. He is the winningest active coach, by winning percentage, in NCAA Division I. His .853 win percentage ranks just ahead of Arizona State's JJ Van Niel (.852) and Nebraska's Dani Busboom Kelly (.852).
Fisher, in fact, is fourth among all coaches in NCAA Division I history (minimum five years) in winning percentage.

WELCOME TO THE HEIGHTS

The Panthers unofficially opened Victory Heights on Aug. 8 for its annual Blue-Gold scrimmage
In front of 2,341 fans, Team Gold pulled off a reverse sweep. Team Blue won the opening two sets 25-23 and 30-28 before Gold rallied with 25-18, 25-20, 15-7 scores for the win.
The $240 million state-of-the-art athletics project provides Pitt student-athletes with national-caliber competition, training, sports performance and medicine facilities.
Announced in 2020, Victory Heights includes a new 2,800-seat arena for the volleyball, gymnastics and wrestling programs. The volleyball team also has its own in-house practice facility.

THE HEIGHT OF VICTORY

Pitt officially opened Victory Heights Sept. 11-13 for the Panther Challenge. The Panthers swept Jacksonville, High Point and Wright State.
Following sweeps of Florida State and Miami, Pitt is now 7-0 inside Victory Heights and has not lost a set in the building.
Having previously played most of its home matches inside Fitzgerald Field House (as well as select matches inside Petersen Events Center), Pitt entered the 2026 season with the longest win streak in the country.
SMU snapped Pitt's 58-match home win streak on Oct. 7, a run that had dated back to Sept. 14, 2023. That streak ties 1990-94 Florida for the seventh-longest in NCAA Division I history.

THE STREAKS DON'T END THOUGH

Just because SMU snapped a few streaks, it doesn't mean the Panthers don't have more.
The Panthers advanced to their fifth consecutive national semifinal with a four-set win over Purdue in 2025. They are one of just four programs in history to accomplish that feat and first since Texas (2012-16).
Pitt has won outright or shared the ACC championship for four straight years. In 2022, Pitt shared the title with Louisville with identical 17-1 records. In 2023, the Panthers went 16-2 to tie Florida State atop the ACC standings and won the league outright in 2024 with a 19-1 mark. Last year, Pitt and Stanford tied atop the league standings at 18-2.
Pitt now has an 11-match road winning streak, which is the third-longest in the country. Only Nebraska (21) and Western Kentucky (18) have longer such streaks. Including three neutral site matches and Pitt has won 14 straight regular season matches outside of Pittsburgh.

NO STARCK CONTRAST

There's nothing stark about the consistency Izzy Starck has brought to Pitt's lineup.
The junior setter ranks in the top 25 in the country in assists per set and she has earned ACC Setter of the Week honors three times this year.
The 2024 AVCA Freshman of the Year and a national champion at Penn State, Starck has averaged 10.73 assists per set during her career, which ranks sixth among active players. She is averaging 10.41 assists per set in her first year with the Panthers.
Starck is guiding an offense that is second in the nation with a .333 attack percentage. Pitt has hit at least .300 in 16-of-22 matches this year and has hit at least .400 four times. Pitt has hit .336 or better in seven consecutive matches.

ON THE ATTACK

As previously mentioned, Pitt ranks second in the country with a .333 attack percentage. Nebraska ranks first at .337. No other team is hitting higher than .313 on the year.
The Panthers are simply getting more efficient as the year wears on. Pitt has hit at least .336 in seven consecutive matches. During that seven-match stretch that began following the team's lone loss of the year, Pitt is hitting .373.
In total, Pitt has hit at least .300 in 16-of-22 matches and at least .400 four times this year, peaking at .476 against Wright State.
Even more impressively, Pitt is hitting .381 inside Victory Heights this season and has reached at least .300 in all seven contests inside the facility.

THE DAILEY DIFFERENCE

Entering the year, Jordyn Dailey was considered Pitt's best offensive weapon among a trio of middle blockers. But over the past six matches, her defense has been a catalyst to a Pitt win streak.
Through the first 16 matches of the season, Dailey recorded 30 blocks, an average of 1.25 per set. Her playing time was sporadic as she worked to find her place defensively in the Panthers' system.
But over the past six matches, Dailey has recorded 32 blocks, an average of 1.88 per set. She has had at least four blocks in every match during that run and had seven in back-to-back contests at Clemson and at Wake Forest.

DIG THIS PROGRESS

Freshman Trinity Thompson entered Pitt as a highly touted setter, breaking the state of Nevada's all-time assist record. So a transition to libero was expected to take some time. But Thompson's growth has come quickly.
Through the first 11 matches of the season, Thompson recorded double-digit digs just one time, but she's hit 11+ three times in the last 11 matches, including a career-best 14 against Stanford.
Thompson is averaging 2.57 digs per set over the past 11 matches after averaging just 1.64 over the first 11 contests.

HARD TO BEAT

Since the start of the 2021 season, nobody in NCAA Division I women's volleyball has won more than Pitt.
Pitt and Nebraska enter the weekend atop the NCAA volleyball world for wins since 2021 with 174 each. Pitt is 174-21 (.892) over that span, while Nebraska is 174-20 (.897). The Panthers are also a remarkable 96-10 (.906) in conference play during that span.
Louisville is third in the country during that stretch with 168 wins, a full six victories behind Pitt and Nebraska.
In non-conference play, Pitt has gone undefeated three times in the last six years, doing so in 2021 (11-0) and 2024 (10-0) prior to another unbeaten (10-0) non-conference slate this year.

STILL GETTING BETTER?

How does the best player in college volleyball get better? Well, for Olivia Babcock, the increase in efficiency has been jaw-dropping.
Babcock leads the country in points per set and ranks third in kills per set despite being just 68th in the country in attacks per set.
She is hitting .371 this year, a steep improvement from .334 a year ago, .323 as a sophomore and .306 as a freshman. Babcock is hitting .447 over the past six matches she has played.
Very few players in the country are attacking as efficiently as Babcock with as much volume as she has. Among the 125 most efficient hitters in the country, Babcock has the highest volume of swings.
Only two players among the top 150 most-efficient players in the country have more attacks than Babcock. Penn State's Kennedy Martin has 814 attacks (compared to 701 for Babcock) but is hitting just .332. Louisville's Chloe Chicoine has 811 attacks but is hitting only .338.
Despite being the focal point of every defense Pitt faces, Babcock's .371 attack percentage ranks sixth among pin hitters.

THE BAYLESS BUILD

Blaire Bayless didn't arrive at Pitt fully built. She built herself here.
Bayless has become the exception in this era of college athletics -- a player who has stayed at the same program for four years and made steady, continual growth throughout her career.
As a freshman in 2023, Bayless played in just seven sets at Pitt with 13 kills. A year later, she saw much more action, playing in 33 matches and 89 sets.
As a junior in 2025, Bayless truly blossomed. She played in 34 matches and 120 sets, increasing her production in almost every area, averaging a career-best 2.65 kills per set on .296 hitting with career-highs in digs (115/0.96 per set), blocks (58/0.48 per set) and points (349/2.91 per set).
But Bayless didn't stop there. In 2026, she is averaging 3.36 kills per set, 1.65 digs per set, 0.58 blocks per set and 3.68 points per set -- each of which are on pace to be career highs. She has become one of the most important pieces to finding balance offensively while also contributing defensively.
Bayless was named to the National Player of the Year Watch List on Oct. 8, becoming the third Pitt player on the list -- along with Olivia Babcock and Izzy Starck.

D-FENCE

Head Coach Dan Fisher said this could be the best defensive team he's coached. With 22 matches down, it's hard to argue against him.
Pitt has outdug 19-of-22 opponents in 2026 and is averaging 1.3 per set more than their opponents. Over the last seven matches, Pitt is outdigging its opponents by 2.8 per set.
Up front, Pitt ranks No. 1 nationally in blocks at 3.21 per set, which is on pace to shatter the program's single-season record. Abbey Emch is No. 5 in the country at 1.54 blocks per set and Abbey Emch is No. 8 at 1.49. Jordyn Dailey does not qualify for the leaderboard as she has not played in 2/3 of all sets but is averaging 1.51 per set.

BLOCK PARTY

While Abbey Emch and Maaike Heilig have block totals that rank among the top 10 in the country, Pitt truly has used a team effort in leading the country in blocks per set.
Six players have at least 40 blocks this year, led by Emch with 81. Heilig adds 76 and Olivia Babcock has 71.
Since the team's run to five straight Final Fours, Pitt has never had more than four players with at least 60 blocks but the Panthers are on pace to have six players reach that milestone this year.

BRING 'EM BACK

On Sept. 26, Olivia Babcock and Blaire Bayless announced that they will return to Pitt for a fifth season in 2027, due to new NCAA rules enacted over the summer.
Babcock and Bayless made the announcement during a timeout at Pitt football's Homecoming victory over Bucknell in Acrisure Stadium.
The duo has led Pitt to three straight trips to the Final Four with an overall record of 113-13. Babcock and Bayless have lost just two home matches in four seasons at Pitt.

THE RPI

The NCAA releases the official RPI rankings each Monday. After ranking No. 1 for each of the first three weeks, Pitt is No. 2 in the country this week.
Nebraska is No. 1 overall, followed by Pitt, Wisconsin, Louisville and Florida. Kentucky, SMU, Oregon, BYU and Arizona State round out the top 10.
As far as the upcoming weekend is concerned, Duke is No. 65 and North Carolina is No. 24.

THEY'VE GOT THEIR EYES ON US

Senior Olivia Babcock and junior transfer Izzy Starck were two of 30 players named to the AVCA Preseason Player of the Year Watch List.
Babcock is the two-time defending AVCA Player of the Year and Starck was named AVCA Freshman of the Year in 2024.
Blaire Bayless was added to the list on Oct. 8, giving Pitt three of the 46 current nominees for the award.

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Players Mentioned

Olivia Babcock

Blaire Bayless

Jordyn Dailey

Abbey Emch

Maaike Heilig

Izzy Starck

Trinity Thompson

University of Pittsburgh Athletics