247Sports • 13th September 2024

Illini volleyball looks to build on 6-0 start with toughest tests to date: 'Definitely a good test for us'

Where were you in 2018? 'God's Plan' and 'Perfect' were two of the biggest songs that year, and 'Avengers: Infinity War' topped the box office if that helps to get a grasp.  Also, Illinois men's basketball was still two years away from its first postseason under Brad Underwood, and Lovie Smith was a third-year head coach at Illinois.

Well, Illinois volleyball is 6-0 for the first time since six years ago when radio listeners – remember the radio? – couldn't escape Drake and Ed Sheeran.

The Ill...

247Sports • 12th September 2024

Club teammates, freshmen Laynie Smith, Ashlyn Philpot spark Illini VB's hot start

Imagine playing the sport that you love at the high school level and receiving offers from college coaches nationwide. You receive an offer from a school in a conference you've always wanted to play in. Then imagine that soon after you committed, one of your closest friends and teammates tells you that they've committed to the same school as you. Then imagine you go on to have immediate success as true freshmen at that school.

That's pretty unreal, right? Like a daytime television script.

Well...

247Sports • 5th September 2024

Illini volleyball enters monthlong road stretch after 3-0 start: 'We're gonna be in some tough environments'

Illinois volleyball is out to a 3-0 start to its season for the first time since 2021 – the season the team went 22-12 and reached the Sweet Sixteen.

Now in his eighth season in Champaign, head coach Chris Tamas is looking to guide the Illinois ship back toward a postseason berth, and a 3-0 start following a sweep of the Best Western Invitational and a four-set win over Illinois State (25-13, 21-25, 25-18, 25-18) in Tuesday's home opener is an encouraging start.

But Tamas and his team won't be...

247Sports • 3rd September 2024

Freshmen help Illini volleyball sweep first weekend, aim for 3-0 start in home opener vs. ISU

Week One was a quick, dominant, almost spotless start to the 2024 season for the Illinois volleyball squad. The Illini went 2-0 at the Best Western Invitational in Bowling Green (Ohio) with a pair of 3-0 sweeps of Cincinnati and Bowling Green. Chris Tamas' squad's closest set was a four-point win.

That success can partly be owed to the team's two freshman stars, Ashlyn Philpot and Laynie Smith. The former club teammates started both matches and seem to have worked their way toward the top of th...

247Sports • 25th August 2024

2024 Illini volleyball season preview: New-look, new-feel Illini have eyes set on bouncing back

CHAMPAIGN — After not hitting expectations in 2023 with a fifth consecutive finish outside the top-five in the Big Ten and a third missed NCAA Tournament in four years, Chris Tamas' Illinois volleyball team is looking to bounce back in a big way.

The Illini are 31-29 over the past two seasons, and the Big Ten, which was already regarded as the toughest volleyball conference in the nation, added four tough Pac-12 programs: USC, UCLA, Oregon and Washington. Two of them join five 'original' Big Te...

247Sports • 21st August 2024

Illini VB star Raina Terry returns for likely record-breaking 2024 season: ''Easiest decision I've ever made'

CHAMPAIGN — In 2020, Chris Tamas made a phone call that may go down as one of the most important calls of his Illinois career.

Days before he picked up the phone, the NCAA had announced that winter sports athletes competing during the COVID-hiccuped 2020-21 season would receive an additional year of eligibility.

The call was made to offer a seemingly-long-away fifth year to a particular underclassman, Raina Terry, who was in her dorm room. Despite starting her collegiate volleyball career just...

247Sports • 10th August 2024

Tamas catches Illini great Poulter's quest for a second gold in Paris: 'The game internationally is awesome'

CHICAGO – The cure to jet lag? Lots of coffee.  At least according to Illinois volleyball head coach Chris Tamas, who just the day before taking to the mic at Big Ten Media Days at the Big Ten Network Studios in Chicago on Monday, was across the pond in France.

"[I] just came back from Paris, watched the Olympics, and the game internationally is awesome," Tamas said at Media Days.

Of course, the Tamases weren't in la Ville Lumière ("the City of Light") just to enjoy a late summer vacation and...

247Sports • 6th August 2024

'We want to get back to the top': Tamas, Illini volleyball hope transfer additions, health boost team in 2024

CHICAGO — Entering his eighth season as head coach of the Illinois Fighting Illini volleyball team, Chris Tamas faces a crucial season this fall. Playing in the toughest volleyball conference in the nation, he's had a pretty successful tenure so far, but Illinois has stumbled in recent years.

In his first three years in Champaign, Tamas went 71-29 overall reached three NCAA tournaments, including leading the Illini to a Final Four finish in 2018. In the four...