Molly Tuozzo and Kentucky will play at defending national champion Penn State Friday. (Vicky Graff Photo)
Kentucky coach Craig Skinner loves the exposure that volleyball has been receiving and never hesitated when he got a chance to face No. 1 Nebraska in the first-ever Broadway Block Party in Nashville, Tennessee’s Bridgestone Arena in downtown Music City last Sunday.
Kentucky won the first two sets before Nebraska rallied to win the match but the real winner was the sport of volleyball.
The match had 1.2 million viewers on ABC-TV to become the most-watched regular season volleyball match of all-time on the ESPN Family of Networks, the Walt Disney Co. announced Thursday.
If that’s not impressive enough, the match also had 11,200 in the arena making it the highest-attended match in Kentucky Volleyball history.
The match was the only scheduled regular-season match on ABC this season until the national championship match on Dec. 21 on ABC.
Kentucky should get a lot of exposure again tonight when it plays at No. 5 Penn State at 8 on FOX. Penn State is the defending national champion and Kentucky is up to No. 4 in the rankings after its performance against Nebraska.
UK will be featured on four ESPN matches this season, including showdowns with No. 3 Pittsburgh on Wednesday and SEC foes Texas, Florida and LSU.
Kentucky will have a neutral-site match with New Hampshire on Saturday at 2 p.m. ET on BTN Plus.
