Penn State men’s volleyball edges George Mason

In the team’s 11th straight win, No. 6 Penn State men’s volleyball overcame a strong George Mason team with a 4-1 victory, winning 25-23, 25-23, 16-25, 25-20 at Rec Hall on Saturday.

“Tonight was the best volleyball we’ve played all season,” said George Mason head coach (and former Penn State assistant) Jay Hopsack.

Hopsack didn’t change his game plan even though he was facing his old team.

“When I got the job at George Mason, the first question on everybody’s mind was ‘What are you going to do to beat Penn State?” he said. “And my reaction is, I’m going to do the same thing to beat Penn State that I do to beat Ohio State, to beat Sacred Heart, we’re going to prepare well, we’re going to get after it in the gym, we’re going to scout, we’ll get a game-plan that hopefully works and as long as we execute, I think we’ll be okay.”

The Patriots, who were coming off a loss to St. Francis the previous night, finished with a .241 hitting percentage and outblocked Penn State 20-14. The offense was led by Christian Malias’s 16 kills. Matias also had seven serving errors of the team’s 22 total.

“It’s been something we’ve been trying to improve upon all year,” said Hopsack. “When we’re serving well, we’re pretty good. It’s kind of been our Achilles’ heal.”

With seven lead changes and 12 tied scores in the first set, Penn State squeaked past George Mason 25-23. A 4-0 run in the final half of the set gave Penn State a 22-18 advantage. While George Mason attempted a comeback, it wasn’t enough as the Nittany Lions managed to hold onto the lead for the win.

The second set played out a little differently.

George Mason led by as many as four early in the set before Penn State staged a comeback. The Nittany Lions finally gained the lead after a George Mason hitting error made the game 23-22. A big block from Spencer Sauter, gave the Nittany Lions their match point. Aiden Albrecht sealed the deal with a hit that was blocked by George Mason and sent out of bounds to make it 25-23.

“When we got to 20 in games one, two and four, we competed as well as we competed the entire match and took our play to another level,” said Penn State head coach Mark Pavlik. “I don't remember very many errors by us, either serving, hitting, blocking errors by us after the score hit 20. We were pretty good when the score hit 20 and I thought that was the difference.”

George Mason controlled the third set with a 6-0 run in the middle to make the game 10-19 and blow past Penn State.

“We had six hitting errors, two service errors, four blocking errors, a ball handling call, and that’s 13 points right there, so they only needed to score 12,” said Pavlik.

The loss of the set woke up the Nittany Lions and the fourth set mirrored the first with six lead changes and 11 ties. A 4-point run, starting with a George Mason service error, ended the game 25-20.

Junior Chris Nugent led the offense with 16 kills and eight digs. Mike Anderson earned Player of the Match honors, Spencer Sauter finished with eight kills and five digs. Taylor Hammond added 36 assists. Overall, the team’s hitting percentage was .221. George Mason’s was .241.

Penn State (12-2, 7-0 EIVA) will host Cal State Northridge on Friday.

This story was originally published February 27, 2016 at 10:56 PM with the headline "Penn State men’s volleyball edges George Mason."