UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. – Allie Holland led a balanced Penn State offensive attack with seven kills on .700 hitting as the 13th-ranked Nittany Lions swept visiting Maryland in a Big Ten women's volleyball match Friday night at Rec Hall.
Penn State .303 as a team as it improved to 15-6 overall and 8-3 in the conference. The Lions moved into a tie with Minnesota for third place in the Big Ten standings. Maryland dropped to 17-6 overall and 5-6 in the conference.
Friday's win completed a two-match season sweep for Penn State over Maryland, but the second victory came much easier than the first. The Lions had to come back from a 2-0 deficit with a reverse sweep in the first meeting.
Maryland looked poised to jump out to an early lead again on Friday, scoring the first four points of the match and eventually taking a 10-5 lead. The Terrapins entered the match as the best blocking team in the nation and showed that skill early on. Rainelle Jones and Sam Csire were putting up a wall and combined on three blocks on the team's first five points.
Penn State eventually found its footing and tied the match at 12-12 with a 4-0 run with Cassie Kuerschen at the service line for three of those points. Following kills by Kaitlyn Hord, Jonni Parker and Anjelina Starck, Kuerschen tied the match with an ace. The Lions took the lead for good at 17-15 with back-to-back kills by Holland and Starck.
Things did get close late in set one. The Terrapins fought off the Lions first three chances at set point before Hord finished it off with a kill.
Penn State dominated set two, hitting .500 with 12 kills while holding Maryland to -.038 hitting. It didn't take long for the Lions to leady by double-digits, doing so at 15-5. They had three aces in the set, coming from Kuerschen, Holland, and Quinn Menger.
The Lions controlled most of set three before the Terrapins again challenged late. Trailing 21-15, they went on a 4-0 run to cut the deficit to two. Hord and Park ended that run with back-to-back kills. Starck went on to end the match with her ninth kill. The freshman nearly had a double-double, adding 11 digs to her stat line.
Parker led the team with 13 kills and added five digs and three blocks. Adanna Rollins finished with nine kills and five digs, while Hord totaled eight kills and three blocks.
Jenna Hampton led the defensive effort with Penn State with 13 digs. Gabby Blossom was right behind her with 12 digs and had 37 assists to finish off her seventh-straight double-double.
Holland didn't record an attack error on her 10 swings. It was the third time this season that the sophomore had at least seven kills without an error.
Csire paced Maryland with 13 kills, eight digs and five blocks. Jones, the national leader in blocks at 1.81/set, led all players with seven.
Penn State is back at Rec Hall on Saturday to take on Illinois on Saturday at 4 p.m. The Illini are 15-7 overall and 7-4 in the Big Ten following three straight wins over Northwester (3-1 score), Michigan (3-1), and Rutgers (3-2). The Illini received the most votes in the AVCA Coaches Poll of any team not ranked in the top 25.
