It was a weekend of mixed feelings and results at Huff Hall, as the No. 19 Illinois volleyball squad fell to No. 13 Minnesota and battled back to defeat Iowa.

The injury-depleted Illini found themselves without the assistance of outside hitter Kayani Turner. The senior, already dealing with a painful nerve condition in her leg, suffered a bicycle accident Friday that resulted in a sprained ankle in the same leg.

“(Turner) tried to go valiantly in game one, our trainer worked on her, we tried to get her to go in game one and she just couldn’t do it,” head coach Don Hardin said.

With Turner out and sophomore outside hitter Nicole Kump unavailable due to a foot injury, the Illini were forced to play a combination of the 5-1 and 6-2 systems with sophomore setter Hillary Haen staying in to play the front row.

“We’re not setting Hillary that much because Hillary hasn’t had that much hitting practice, although she did put one or two away,” Hardin said. “I’m sure if we have to stay with this a while, we’ll start coming up with a set that we can give to her.”

After losing to the Golden Gophers in five sets Friday, Illinois rallied to defeat the Hawkeyes on Saturday in four sets (25-23, 25-17, 19-25. 25-15).

“Even though it was a little bit of a dull performance tonight, there were some really good things that happened to take care of business,” Hardin said.

Hardin’s concern following Friday’s loss was that the team would experience an emotional let-down and fail to play well against Iowa. But sophomore outside hitter Laura DeBruler sparked the Illini on Saturday, hitting .326 with 21 kills and 15 digs. Ann Edinger was an intangible factor for the Fighting Illini all weekend.

“She’s just giving everything every single play,” Hardin said of Edinger. “If we’re ahead by 10 or 15 points, she could care less, she’s gonna sacrifice her body for the next play as if it’s the most important thing out there.”

But Edinger and DeBruler were not alone last weekend, as Haen proved effective in her new spot Friday, recording a kill and a block assist from the front row.

The Illini dropped the first set to the Golden Gophers, 23-25, but they regrouped to take the match to five sets before dropping the fifth set, 8-15.

DeBruler was a bright spot for the Fighting Illini, posting 24 kills and a career-best 22 digs on the night to become the most recent Illini to join the 20-20 Club. The last member to join the club was Sue Webber (22-26) on Oct. 12, 2002.

“Towards the end it was getting a little tiring, but I have to do it for my team,” DeBruler said.

Edinger liked what she saw defensively from the squad.

“It was exciting to see that we were staying in those points and we’re putting ourselves in an opportunity to take over and go to the next step,” Edinger said. “I’m happy to see that our block, besides that last game, did a really good job of slowing it down because defense isn’t just passing, it’s on the block too. I think we did a pretty good job. We took a step in the right direction even though we lost.”

With its play this weekend, Illinois improved to 11-4 overall and 2-2 in the Big Ten. And the Illini know the next few weeks of conference play will be critical.

“About another couple weeks from now, another four matches in the Big Ten season teams start assuming an identity, sometimes in a good way, sometimes in a bad way,” Hardin said. “Our job is to keep pressing the ceiling and getting better. One thing I trust in this team is they’re not going to settle in to an identity and be happy with that.”