Post by bigfan on May 6, 2006 11:14:34 GMT -5
MEN'S VOLLEYBALL
Penn State meets UCLA for national title today
By Gordon Brunskill
UNIVERSITY PARK -- No matter what, the men's volleyball season ends tonight.
And, for the first time in 11 years, Penn State is still playing.
After a draining match that lasted nearly three hours, the Nittany Lions will be back on the Rec Hall floor again at 7 p.m. for their last match together, against UCLA with the national collegiate championship at stake.
"I think as a senior you can't ask for anything better," middle hitter Nate Meerstein said. "We have been wanting to play for this all year and to be able to end the season on the last game possible is the best thing you could look forward to, especially on your home floor."
Penn State stunned No. 1 California-Irvine in five games Thursday night to reach the finals, earning the decisive point on a dramatic service ace from freshman Max Holt. The match was full of emotional ebbs and flows with more than 3,000 fans on hand.
They are hoping for a sellout crowd tonight against a program that has 18 national titles to its credit and 25 final appearances. Penn State is in the finals for the 12th time, winning in 1994.
As of 4 p.m. Friday, about 4,000 of the 5,812 seats available had been sold, including about 1,000 on Friday, according to the Penn State sports information department.
"They definitely scored us points and kept us in it," Meerstein said of Thursday's crowd. "They were like a seventh man out there and there were times we sort of rode them to make sure we stayed in the match."
The schools have met seven times in the final tournament, with the Bruins winning all but one -- in the 1994 title match. UCLA beat the Nittany Lions in last year's semifinals as well.
The teams also met in January, with a Bruins sweep. Both head coaches, however, feel that outcome means nothing today.
"They have improved and we have certainly improved," said Bruins coach Al Scates, whose team has won its last 13 matches. "I'm not particularly interested in looking at video from that match and probably won't even look at it. We brought it. They were two different teams at that time."
UCLA has shuffled its lineup considerably since then, with opposite hitter Steve Klosterman coming off shoulder surgery and several new starters in the lineup.
Penn State also has changed its lineup, and the Nittany Lions have made definite improvements in its passing lately, with their best effort of the season Thursday. The backrow defense will be a key for both teams, allowing for more options for the offenses.
"They've always been great defensively," Penn State coach Mark Pavlik said. "They're going to live and die with being able to create opportunities for themselves and finish it. We've got to execute over time pretty well and we can't let our lack of execution lead to point-scoring opportunities for them."
Some of that may come from the service line. Both teams made plenty of service errors in the semifinals, when the Nittany Lions had 25 errors while UCLA had 19 against Indiana-Purdue Fort Wayne. Penn State also had seven aces and the Bruins had eight.
"I think the only part of our game that really struggled was our serving," Penn State senior opposite Matt Proper said. "If we miss a couple less serves, then we'll be even better."
Both teams had rocky patches this year, and there were concerns whether the Nittany Lions would even be in the tournament despite being the host. None of that matters now.
"We haven't had the best season," Proper said. "We definitely had as many highs and lows, if not more, than every other season that I've been a part of. We always look toward the final four as our main goal and Pav always says we've got to be at our best come May. We were pretty close to our best (Thursday) night."
Notes: Penn State is 27-1 at Rec Hall over the last two seasons, losing only to Ball State in January. ... Penn State has won four national titles at home in the last half-century or so. The wrestling team won at Rec Hall in 1953, the men's gymnastics team did likewise in 1960, the women's lacrosse team won the USWLA title in 1979, and the men's and women's fencing teams earned the 1991 title. Also, UCLA beat the Nittany Lions for the 1982 crown at Rec Hall.