Penn State got dominated by No. 1 Nebraska earlier this weekend and looked to bounce back against Iowa. The squad did just that with a 3-0 win against the Hawkeyes.
After Iowa scored its first point, Penn State went on a 6-0 scoring run to give itself a 7-1 lead. Iowa gave away a lot of points, with four of those points being scored by errors.
After going back and forth, the Hawkeyes ended up scoring six of the next seven points to even the match at 13. Then, Kennedy Martin entered the match and recorded her first kill of the match to build momentum for the blue and white.
Martin put the Nittany Lions on a 3-0 run that was ended by a kill from Chard’e Vanzandt put the Hawkeyes on a hot streak of a 4-0 run of their own. Martin put the team on her back with an ace and Emmi Sellman added her third kill to force Iowa to call a timeout.
The blue and white continued momentum out of the timeout with a Martin ace and kill, and to end the set, Maggie Mendelson got the tip over the net to give the Nittany Lions set 1 25-22. The squad had a .382 hitting percentage in the first set.
Penn State earned the first point of the second set, but Iowa scored five of the next six to gain a 5-2 lead.
Ava Falduto got her first ace of the match to give Penn State an 11-8 lead, and the squad started going on a roll. Martin and Sellman had two kills to extend the lead 16-11.
Penn State started to pull away. Caroline Jurevicius added her fourth kill with Mendelson and Martin adding to their kill totals to gain a 23-14 lead.
The Hawkeyes responded with a 6-0 run to make it 23-20, but it was ended by Mendelson, who extended the lead to 25-20. The Nittany Lions took the second set 25-21 off a service error by the black and gold.
Iowa opened the third set on fire, scoring four of the first five points to open with a 4-1 lead. Sellman added a kill to lighten the damage, but the Hawkeyes stormed back to a 7-2 lead, forcing Penn State to call a timeout.
Vanzandt added an ace, but then Sellman got her seventh kill of the match to end Iowa’s run. The black and gold cleaned up their game and had a 10-5 lead early in the third set.
The Nittany Lions tried to keep it within reach as they marched back to keep the distance at five, down 15-10. Iowa went on a 3-0 scoring run that was answered by a Gabrielle Nichols block. That started to give the blue and white some momentum.
The squad scored the next six out of nine points, and after Martin’s 15th kill, the Hawkeyes called a timeout. Penn State trailed 21-18.
After the timeout, Nichols and Sellman added blocks to cut the lead to 21-20, and Iowa called its last timeout.
The Hawkeyes cleaned it up and extended their lead to 24-21. Iowa closed it out 25-22, and a fourth set was needed.
Both teams started the set trading off points as it was notched up at 3-3. The Hawkeyes reached up to six, but that was stopped after Martin registered back-to-back kills to cut the lead to 6-5.
The Nittany Lions went on a 4-0 run to force Iowa to take a timeout with the blue and white leading 10-8.
Penn State was the first to 15, leading 15-14. Penn State got production from all of its hitters in Martin, Jurevicus and Sellman to make it a 17-14 lead.
Penn State could never get more than a three-point lead as the squad was up 21-18, but Iowa answered with a point to make it 21-19.
The Nittany Lions had five players with a hitting percentage of .250 or higher.
Martin ended the game for the squad on an ace as Penn State took the fourth set 25-20 and the match 3-1.
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