No. 21 Badgers can't tame No. 1 Nittany Lions
October 24, 2008 | Volleyball
The No. 21 Wisconsin volleyball team gave a solid effort but was unable to out-muscle the top-ranked team in the country Friday night. Penn State came into Madison and swept the Badgers, 25-20, 25-16, 25-21 in front of a season-high 6,296 fans at the UW Field House. Wisconsin drops to 14-7 overall, 4-5 in the Big Ten Conference while Penn State remains undefeated at 21-0, 9-0 and has yet to lose a set this season. The loss snaps Wisconsin 's five-match home winning streak and seven-match home Big Ten winning streak.
'That's a very good team,' UW head coach Pete Waite said. 'They only lost one starter from last year's national championship team and they're more athletic, more mature. They make less errors and there's such a small margin of error on our side of the net. You just cannot make an error because they're not going to make any.'
Penn State came into Madison leading the Big Ten in six of the eight team categories. Tonight the Nittany Lions did much of the same and led in four categories, beginning with their offensive statistics. PSU hit .340 on the night while Wisconsin was limited to .133. The Badgers were led by eight kills from sophomore Allison Wack and she hit .294 on the night. Senior Morgan Salow contributed seven kills. Senior Audra Jeffers had the best hitting percentage of the Badger outside hitters and middle blockers at .308.
Nicole Fawcett led all players with 17 kills and two Nittany Lions players hit .600 or better. Penn State had 46 kills compared to Wisconsin's 34 kills.
'I thought we battled pretty well, but they're hitting at such high angles, you can't even train that, and you don't even play most teams on your schedule with balls coming at you at that height over the top of your block,' Waite said. 'Some of them have great reaches. They don't just reach and hit it down where your block is'they hit it, reach high and hit deep in the court which is a great shot and very tough to defend.'
PSU also had more assists than the Badgers with the 43-32 advantage. Sophomore Nikki Klingsporn and freshman Janelle Gabrielsen split the bill for the Badgers with 14 and 12 assists, respectively. Alisha Glass paced the Penn State offense with 35 assists.
Penn State out-blocked the Badgers, 9-5 and was led by five stuffs from Arielle Wilson. Salow and freshman Elle Ohlander had three blocks each for the Badgers.
The Badgers did out-dig the Nittany Lions, finishing with the 30-25 advantage. Wack and Gabrielsen led the Badgers with seven saves. Glass led all players with nine digs.
The Badgers also had a better showing at the service line, recording just four errors compared to the eight, four of which came in the third set, by Penn State. Both teams finished with two aces on the night.
Wisconsin jumped out to a 3-0 lead in the first set and got the crowd into it early. Penn State overtook the lead but the Badgers used a two-point rally with a service ace by Gabrielsen and a Badger block to go up 7-5. Both teams played each other close until the Nittany Lions outscored the Badgers 7-3 to take a 20-17 lead. Wisconsin came close at 21-19 off a kill by junior Brittney Dolgner and a PSU attack error, but would score one more point in the 25-20 set one win for PSU. Jeffers recorded five kills in the first set and hit a team-best .400.
In the second, Wisconsin stayed close early but a six-point rally helped the Nittany Lions go up 17-10. The Badgers never got back into it but did hold off PSU set point with a Badger block before falling, 25-16. Penn State was dominant on the block in the second period, recording five stuffs and limiting the Badgers to a .000 hitting percentage.
The Badgers came out strong in the third set and led by as many as four at 10-6. Penn State would then out-score the Badgers 9-3, which included a five-point run, to take a 15-13 lead. The Badgers would knot the score at 15 on a Caity DuPont service ace. Penn State again took the lead and led by as many as four before Wisconsin pulled within two at 23-21 down the stretch but the Lions tallied the final two points to take the match, 25-21.
The Badgers will look to snap their three-match skid Sunday when Indiana comes to town. First serve is set for 1 p.m. inside the UW Field House.
'I think one of the positives out of (tonight), I mean obviously we wanted to get the win, but Penn State's a great team and I thought that we came out and really started to compete,' Klingsporn said. 'I thought that was good for us to come out competing after a losing weekend.'
