April 10, 2018
ROSEMONT, Ill. - Senior Katie O'Donnell (West Chester, Pa.) and freshman Quinn Nicolai (Moorestown, N.J.) were each honored by the Big Ten Conference with weekly accolades for their performances during a 22-13 victory over then-No. 6 Virginia last week. O'Donnell was named the Big Ten Co-Offensive Player of the Week while Nicolai earned Freshman of the Week honors as announced by the league office earlier Tuesday afternoon.
O'Donnell was also named Brine/US Lacrosse Player of the Week late Monday evening. The senior registered a career-high eight points while tying her single-game career-bests of six goals and two assists against the Cavaliers last Friday.
O'Donnell has now scored at least one goal in 36-straight contests dating back to her sophomore season while her 40 goals rank third in the Big Ten and tied for 24th nationally.
O'Donnell also became just the 14th player in program history to reach the 200-point mark for her career. The senior moved up from 15th to ninth on the all-time points list at Penn State and now has 205 career points. O'Donnell is only 18 goals shy of becoming just the fourth player in Penn State history to hit the 200 goal milestone. She is currently tied for sixth nationally among active players with her 182 career goals.
Nicolai also had a career-best effort against Virginia registering six points with career-highs of four goals and two assists. The freshman is now tied with classmate Sophia Triandafils (Wading River, N.Y.) for the team lead by rookies with 23 points on identical stat lines of 18 goals and five assists in 13 games played.
Nicolai has scored at least one goal in 11 games this season including seven straight contests with four multi-goal efforts on the year.
O'Donnell becomes the third Nittany Lion to earn Offensive Player of the Week honors being recognized a second time this season (February 27) while sophomore Maria Auth (Street, Md.) was Penn State's additional honoree (March 20). Nicolai joins classmate Lucy Lowe (Cockeysville, Md.) becoming the second rookie to earn Freshman of the Week laurels so far this season after Lowe was acknowledged on March 20.
Penn State returns to action on Saturday hosting No. 7 Northwestern at 6 p.m. as they look to break a three-way tie atop the Big Ten as both the Wildcats and Maryland join the Nittany Lions at 3-0 through the first-half of conference play.