State College is a tough place to win, especially against a Nittany Lion team that swept the Gophers in 3 sets at the PAV, but the Gophs won in 4 sets, 27-25, 25-21, 23-25, 25-18. It was closer than the box score indicates. The Gophs took a 19-12 lead in Set 1, but a Penn State run tied the set at 19-19, and it was 21-21, 23-23 & 25-25 before the Gophers escaped with the win. Samedy had 11 kills, and Miyabe added 7. A single kill from Myers was the only hint of Middle Offense.
The Gophers never led in Set 2, even trailing 17-13, until clawing their way back with a 12-4 run. Penn State slowed Samedy and Miyabe down, 5 kills and 2 kills, but the Gopher scoring started with aces from Samedy and Myers, and finished with blocks by Myers, Husemann & Wenaas. A single kill from Husemann was the only hint of Middle Offense.
The Gophers never led in Set 3 either, but after falling behind 8-12, they came back to tie the set at 12-12, 15-15, 18-18 & 22-22, before losing. Husemann had one of her best sets of the season with 2 kills, a block and an assist on a Samedy kill. Miyabe, who had been so effective in Set 1, was off her game, and was replaced for one full rotation by Glenn. (Glenn had one kill and one error in maybe 4 swings.)
The Gophers never trailed in Set 4, and after an 8-8 tie began to dominate, leading 13-10 & 20-14 on their way to victory. Their final run included back-to-back serves by Wenaas that hit the tape and dropped on the Penn State side of the net. Wenaas also contributed 4 kills in Set 4, her most productive set.
The Penn State Middles out-hit and out-blocked Gophers, but it wasn’t enough to off-set Samedy’s 25 kills (and 13 digs). And by my count, the Gophers once again had zero kills on dinks.
The BTN announcer suggested that Samedy is a shoe-in to repeat as Big Ten Player of the Year, and campaigned for Samedy as National Player of the Year. She gets my vote – or would if I had one.
[But this same announcer drove me nuts constantly babbling about hitters swinging for “High Hands,” i.e., deliberately trying to smash the ball out-of-bounds off the fingertips of the opposing blockers. Big Ten Volleyball is clearly a higher level of competition than I have ever participated in, so maybe this is actually more common than I’m just not aware of — but I am skeptical. I think that this would be like a pitcher trying to induce a pop-up. I think, mostly, they are blasting away with the expectation that if they can hit the ball really hard, any number of good things might happen – and sometimes the ball goes out-of-bounds off the fingertips of the opposing blockers.]
NEXT: The Gopher finish their Big Ten Season tomorrow night at Maryland, 6:00 on BTN+. Maryland is 7 & 12 in the Big Ten, but one of League-leading Wisconsin’s 3 losses came at Maryland, so lets hope our 14 & 5 Gophers don’t take Maryland for granted.