CAMBRIDGE, Mass. – No. 3 Penn State men's volleyball remained atop the EIVA standings with a 3-0 (25-16, 25-15, 25-23) sweep at Harvard on Friday. The Nittany Lions upped their record to 19-3 overall and 5-0 in the conference while the Crimson dropped to 7-12 overall and 0-5 in league play.
Cole Bogner totaled 33 assists while leading Penn State to .457 hitting. He spread the wealth with five Lions finishing with at least five kills. Cal Fisher led the way with 10, while Michal Kowal and Toby Ezeonu were next with eight apiece. Owen Rose had seven kills. Brett Wildman contributed five.
Rose and Ezeonu were efficient in the middle. Rose tallied his seven kills on .875 hitting while Ezeonu's eight kills came on .583 hitting.
Penn State racked up eight aces. Fisher also led in that category with three. Kowal and Ezeonu each had two, and Bogner added one.
Zach Berty and Trevor Schultz put up identical stat lines for Harvard with each posting seven kills and two errors on 11 attempts for .455 hitting.
The Lions upped their EIVA regular season winning streak to 23 matches, with the last loss coming to George Mason on April 3, 2021.
Penn State is one match ahead of Charleston (WV) in the EIVA standings. The Eagles improved to 4-1 with a 3-1 win over NJIT on Friday.
Set 1
Penn State came out strong in the first set, hitting .571 while cruising to a 25-16 win. Bogner tallied 11 assists, including five that went to Fisher. Rose was perfect on his three swings. Ezeonu had a pair of aces in the set. The first put the Lions up 7-2 and the second made the score 18-8.
Set 2
Bogner added 10 more assists and Penn State again hit .571 in a 25-15 win in set two. Ezeonu had four kills and no errors to hit .800 in the set. Fisher served for three aces during a 6-0 run to help the Lions go up 22-13.
Set 3
Harvard led 13-12 before Penn State went up 16-13 with a 4-0 run. The run included three straight kills by Fisher, Sam Marsh, and Kowal. It was capped by a block from Marsh and Kowal. The Crimson cut their deficit to one at 18-17 and twice late at 23-22 and 24-23. Bogner set Kowal for the match-clinching kill.
Up Next
Penn State and Harvard play again on Saturday at 3 p.m.
