UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. – The No. 10 Penn State men's volleyball team swept its first weekend of EIVA conference play with its second victory of the weekend, a 3-0 win (25-22, 25-20, 25-20) over NJIT in Rec Hall's South Gym Saturday night.
Penn State (6-6, 2-0 EIVA) was the only EIVA team to sweep both its conference matches this weekend with its win over the Highlanders (6-4, 1-2 EIVA) and Princeton Friday night.
HOW IT HAPPENED
NJIT started off hot to lead 13-8 after a four-point run and Penn State called its first timeout. The timeout allowed Penn State to regroup and the Nittany Lions went on a six-point run to retake the lead 14-13. Henrik Falck Lauten had a pair of kills and block, Jason Donorovich had two blocks, and Brett Wildman's serve run included an ace.
Wildman had a great offensive set overall, leading Penn State with eight kills versus only one error in the set. He also had support from Henrik Falck Lauten, who started a bit slow but had four kills late in the frame and Cal Fisher, whose second kill was the game clincher for the Nittany Lions at 25-22.
In the second set, Penn State took the initial surge with four out of five points to lead 8-6, but NJIT had a three-point response to take a 9-8 edge.
Another run in the middle of the set for the Nittany Lions flipped momentum back to the Blue and White. Donorovich was in the heart of the run with a pair of kills and a block and the Highlanders called timeout trailing 13-10.
The Highlanders scored four of the next five to tie the score 14-all but another four-point run, this time Penn State's way, put the Nittany Lions right back in the driver's seat, capped by a Donorovich service ace.
Penn State maintained control the rest of the game by maintaining at least a three-point margin to win the frame by five. The Nittany Lions hit .355 and .333 in the first two games.
The Nittany Lions offense showed no signs of slowing down in the third set by taking an early 6-3 lead after back-to-back kills by Falck Lauten. NJIT managed to keep the set close until Fisher stepped to the service line with the Nittany Lions leading 17-14.
Behind Fisher's serve, Penn State put NJIT off balance and ended up with a pair a huge blocks to lead by five, the same score they would win by to finish the match.
HEAR IT FROM THEM
Head Coach Mark Pavlik
- I'm real pleased with our pass and serve game. Will's been playing at a level that I haven't seen with passing here since the days of maybe Ricky Mattei and Dennis [Del Valle] late in his career and Jason Kepner back in that '94, '95, '96 era. I can't say enough about the consistency that our approach was this week coming into this weekend and how we carried that through, certainly yesterday and today.
Senior Jason Donorovich
- On how PSU took handled NJIT's physicality: I think it was just trusting each other. The defense trusts our block to kind of slow things down and take really big parts of the court and then we trust them to get big time digs and we work hard to get them in transition on those big guys. [NJIT is] physical. They take big swings and they try to pick apart your block, so you just have to trust your abilities and trust those around you and we'll be alright like tonight."
Redshirt Sophomore Will Bantle
- On his defensive mentality: "I think there is more of like an intensity in some of these games. Yeah it's positioning and all of these different things but when you get a feel for these players then there is a big block in front of it and you know where the block is going to be. It makes my job pretty easy. It's just wait for the ball to come and try to dig it pretty much, keep it off the floor."
MIKE ANDERSON MAN OF THE MATCH
Brett Wildman was the focal point of Penn State's offense once again, finishing with a game-high 17 kills and hitting .560 (17-3-25). Wildman was excellent in game one with eight kills and no errors (.727). He also had an ace, but his serve was also very disruptive all evening for the Highlanders offense.
NOTABLE STATS
- Cal Fisher was effective from all areas of the court for the Nittany Lions. He had eight kills at .389, seven digs, and was extremely effective at the service line with a match-best three aces.
- Will Bantle had 12 digs and went 15-15 on serve receive. It was his second double-digit dig performance of 2020.
- Henrik Falck Lauten was third on Penn State with 10.5 points off eight kills, three blocks, and an ace.
- Jason Donorovich finished with five blocks and added five kills and a service ace.
- Penn State's .345 team hitting percentage was its first team hitting percentage over .300 since Jan. 26 vs. USC (.381).
NEXT UP
Penn State makes its annual New England trip next weekend, Feb. 21-22, with matches at Sacred Heart and Harvard.