Penn State's annual "Wear White" game was a battle of big swings

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa.- “Big swings” were the theme of Friday night’s match in which the No. 16 Nittany Lions fell to No. 1 Nebraska in a jam-packed Rec Hall.

Despite their outstanding performance in the first two sets, the Blue and White were unable to hold out against the undefeated Cornhuskers.

Now 22-0 overall, Nebraska has steamrolled over both their non-conference and Big Ten opponents this season.

Junior outside hitter Merritt Beason, who has been crucial to the Cornhuskers’ attack all season, was a key element of this match. Her nearly perfect six kills on seven swings in the fourth set gave Nebraska the edge they needed to tie the match before a pair of kills from her and Harper Murray closed out the match in set five.

Penn State’s own star outside hitter Jess Mruzik even said she was unhappy with how she handled Murray’s offensive threat.

“I thought personally I could’ve done a better job of adjusting to her but, that's just something we need to do a better job of looking forward,” Mruzik said.

Although they dropped the last three sets, Penn State fought tooth and nail until the bitter end. In the final set, the Nittany Lions went down 8-3 but managed to fight back with a 4-0 run and eventually even the score 10-10 on a kill by Camryn Hannah.

They managed to tie the score again at 13-13 after briefly going down by two, but couldn’t quite finish it off.

When asked about what Nebraska did well, Penn State Head Coach Katie Schumacher-Cawley placed emphasis on the strength and power of their offense.

“They don’t stop. They were taking big swings. I thought they played the complete game,” Schumacher-Cawley said.

Regardless of the final score, she was not unhappy with the way her team played.

“I like to see our players take big swings and I’m proud of the way they did that and they didn’t give up at the end,” Schumacher-Cawley.

“Big” is a good way to describe Penn State’s attack in the first set. The team hit .552 on 15 assists from Podraza with five players tallying three or more kills. The Nittany Lions jumped up to a 4-0 lead and ended up leading by as much as 11 multiple times throughout the set.

“Tonight we set a standard for ourselves that I think we’re never gonna forget,” senior middle blocker Taylor Trammell said.

This incredible effort was fueled by the 6,645 fans who flooded Rec Hall for the annual “Wear White” game. The incredible atmosphere that the crowd created gave the team the full Penn State effect.

On Sunday, the Nittany Lions will travel to West Lafayette, Ind. to face the No. 19 Purdue Boilermakers, who just recently fell to Wisconsin last Wednesday.

“One team is going to lose twice this week and obviously we don’t want to be that team,” Trammell said.

The match is set to take place at 1 p.m. in Holloway Gymnasium.

Anna Licastro is a second-year majoring in broadcast journalism. To contact her, email arl5942@psu.edu.