UNIVERSITY PARK — After the completion of all NCAA winter championships, Penn State has moved into third place in the Division I U.S. Sports Academy Directors' Cup standings.

Post a comment

So what will members of the Penn State men’s volleyball team remember most about this past weekend?

UNIVERSITY PARK — Seth Whitehill’s third pitch of the afternoon was launched into the right field bleachers. His sixth pitch was deposited over the right field bleachers.

UNIVERSITY PARK — No. 6 Michigan shut down Penn State 3-0 Sunday at Nittany Lion Field to close the softball season.

IRVINE, Calif. — Another trophy is coming back to State College.

IRVINE, Calif. — Another trophy is coming back to State College.

The same passing combination that thrilled so many Penn State football fans and brought the Nittany Lions a national championship in 1982 hooked up again recently.

From CDT staff reports

Top-seeded Penn State's men's volleyball team won its second title Saturday, defeating Pepperdine 3-1. With the win, the Nittany Lions finished the season 30-1. For more from the game, see tomorrow's Centre Daily Times and CentreDaily.com.

From CDT staff reports IRVINE, Calif. — Absent for the last few weeks, the blocking game reappeared for the Penn State men’s volleyball team Thursday night. It was the right place and the right time for the Nittany Lions. So it was only appropriate that Max Holt and Ryan Sweitzer recorded the last one on the final point of the match — sending Penn State into the National Collegiate Championship for the second time in three seasons. The Nittany Lions overcame a rocky second game with a decisive edge in stuffs for the 30-21, 26-30, 30-22, 30-17 victory at California-Irvine’s Bren Events Center. Top-ranked Penn State (29-1) will face Pepperdine in the championship match at 7 p.m. Saturday. The Waves swept Long Beach State 30-26, 30-21, 30-26 in Thursday’s other semifinal. “It’s very exciting to be able to go to a finals match twice in a career said junior Matt Anderson, who was a freshman on the 2006 title-match team. “Most people don’t even get to go to one. It will be interesting and hopefully we can pull it out (Saturday).” The Nittany Lions built a brick wall above the net, with a season-high 18 blocks, including nine in the third game alone. Leading the party was sophomore middle hitter Max Lipsitz with a career-high 12 and Ryan Sweitzer with six. “I thought we did a great job doing what we had been practicing the past couple weeks,” Lipsitz said. “Not overrunning the sets and just getting where we needed to go, reaching over the net.” Carrying the Nittany Lions’ offense was Anderson, the AVCA national co-Player of the Year, who finished with 30 kills for his second 30-kill match of the season. He also succeeded at a .469 rate for the night. “I was seeing the block really well tonight,” Anderson said. “Before the match, (coach Mark Pavlik) told me to swing high, swing hard. It doesn’t matter if I get blocked a couple times, keep swinging hard. That’s really what I was trying to do tonight.” Sweitzer added 17 kills and a pair of aces, Luke Murray had 50 assists and Dennis Del Valle had 14 digs as Penn State finished hitting .410 as a team. The Buckeyes (20-8) were led by four blocks each from Dan Mathews, Brett Versen, Ben Spurlock and Ted Schoenfeldt as the team racked up 11 total rejections. Versen added 13 kills, Robbie Klein had 10 kills and Mathews had 32 assists. Penn State found its blocking in the third game, turning back one Buckeye swing after another. The Nittany Lions racked up nine stuffs in the game, forcing Ohio State into .141 hitting. The match turned in a stretch midway through the game. Tied at 17-17, Penn State blocked Buckeye swings on four straight points. The first was a solo stuff by Murray, who teamed with Lipsitz on the next, then Anderson had a block before he teamed with Lipsitz on the next point. Anderson then completed a 5-0 run with a big kill off the hands of a Buckeye blocker. “It was huge, huge,” Anderson said of the blocking run. “Everybody in volleyball knows that blocking gets the crowd into it, gets your team into it and it kind of gets the other team down a little bit.” Penn State dominated Game 1, hitting .552 to go with three aces. The team ripped off an 8-1 run late in the game to take control, highlighted by two kills and two aces from Sweitzer and two kills from Anderson. The Nittany Lions did not hit too poorly in the second game, but their passing caused some serious problems, limiting the offense. They still hit .391 to the Buckeyes’ .271, but Ohio State had three aces and five blocks to knot the series at one game apiece. The Nittany Lions were never threatened in the final frame, building a fast 16-6 lead as Ohio State never crawled closer than seven points the rest of the night. Penn State is seeking its second national title to go with the one captured in 1994.

Here’s a running list of players who’ve given oral commitments to Penn State:

On a perfect day for the Blue/White game, Penn State fans are buzzing.

Milton and Lois Morgan, who several years ago designated a leadership gift to support what is now the Morgan Academic Support Center for Student-Athletes, have added a million-dollar commitment to endow the Morgan Center’s director’s position.

Penn State linebacker Sean Lee will miss the 2008 season after tearing the anterior cruciate ligament in his right knee during Friday’s practice.

Ready for Penn State's Blue/White weekend, anyone?

CARMEL, Ind. — Penn State shot a two-round score of 640 Monday to end the first day of the Indiana Inviational in 14th place out of 15 teams.

Coach Joe Paterno's dealings with the media over time will be examined in a new Penn State course, "COMM497G: Joe Paterno, Communications and The Media."

Penn State's rugby teams are on the road -- in England and in California.

The tournament field is set. Now for your bracket ...

INDIANAPOLIS — The slate may have been swept clean for the Penn State women’s basketball team heading into the Big Ten Tournament, but once Thursday’s opening round game was played the story remained the same.